Memories and Memories and Memories

Not even a pensieve would be able to hold all of Remus Lupin's memories of Sirius Black. And at times these memories seem to haunt him, bittersweetly, so that he almost wishes that they hadn't happened so that they would stop being his ghosts. Almost. He doesn't really want them to have never happened, because how dull and grey would life have been if Sirius hadn't been there?

But even, or maybe especially, when he was trying not to, Remus remembered. Good things and bad things and things in between, he remembered. The good things were bad because they couldn't happen again now that Sirius was dead, and the bad things were still bad because they just were, and the things in between, the little annoyances or small happinesses that happened when Sirius was around, reminded Remus far too much of how life had been before things fell apart. It hurt to remember, but it would hurt even more to forget.

So Remus remembered.

He remembered coming to Hogwarts and being Sorted into Gryffindor and meeting these three boys who were his new roommates, and one of them seemed almost as outcast as himself for something he could not help any more than Remus could help his lycanthropy. The Blacks were Dark and werewolves were Dark, and it was then that Remus first started feeling drawn to Sirius. They had a shared Darkness as well as a shared reluctance to let that Darkness claim them.

He remembered the confrontation in his second year, remembered regretting and not regretting that it had happened. He regretted that he hadn't been able to keep his promise to his mother that he would never tell anyone what he was because not everyone was accepting as they were, but he didn't regret his new friends knowing, didn't regret that Sirius had figured it out, because Sirius was just so clever, and well, at least they thought it was neat rather than wanting to turn him in to the Registry or to tell the whole school what he was.

He remembered the years passing, and detentions earned and Quidditch matches won, and all the times that Sirius had gone to Hogsmeade or just a convenient broom closet with a girl. Susan Fletcher. Amanda Hopkins. Tracey Miller. Katherine Burns. Patricia Bolton. None of them lasted very long, but Remus never liked them, and it took him a long time to figure out exactly why.

One of the most painful memories--waking up in the hospital wing and being told that Sirius had sent Snape to the Willow and nearly to his death at Remus's unknowing hands. It was a bad memory, one that Remus tried to shy away from and couldn't, because it had been such a Sirius thing to do, because only Sirius would have done something so reckless and unthinking and stupid and thought that things would be all right afterwards.

Memories of sixth and seventh year, of things not being quite right between them, and somehow that being more wrong than anything else. Memories of looking at Sirius, quiet in the common room, and thinking that it was wrong and shouldn't be that way and Sirius should have some shot at happiness and who do you think you are, Remus Lupin, to think that you could give him that happiness that you somehow desperately want him to have, even after how he betrayed you? Is it only because he too knows what Darkness is and continually tastes its temptation that you feel so drawn to him, or because he is Light within the Dark and helps you illuminate your Dark too?

Memories and memories and memories. Leaving school, trying to find work as the other three found it easily. Sirius inviting him to share his flat, and his acceptance, because maybe this would make Sirius happy, and somehow that would make Remus himself happier too. Maybe it was love or maybe it was friendship or brotherhood of some sort, but Remus didn't know and even if he did, he wasn't sure it mattered. It was a strong feeling, a good feeling, and it didn't need to be anything more, not really.

Another of the worst memories--waking up again and this time being told that James and Lily and Peter were dead and that Sirius had killed them. Sirius, Remus's Sirius, though he'd never allowed himself to think of him that way. And then Sirius was as good as dead, because he was in Azkaban, and there would be no possibility for his happiness there because Azkaban sucked the good memories from your soul, and somehow it was that that made Remus feel the worst. James and Lily and Peter were dead and Sirius was having his happiness drained away by things more Dark than Remus, and God, what did the memories matter anymore if they were just going to sit there in his brain and prod him every once in a while like a rusty nail to remind him of the lesson he learned so long ago, that innocence is nothing and hope dies and happiness is useless if it can be so easily gone. Sirius had given in to the Darkness inside him while Remus had remained strong, and that was a betrayal of one of the few things that they had shared and Sirius and James had not, but Sirius had betrayed James too so it wasn't like Remus alone had been hurt.

The years went by and Remus passed over those memories, because they didn't have Sirius in them and he was supposed to be thinking of Sirius anyway, and thought of him even when he wasn't supposed to, and those years didn't matter. They were just the story of a messed up life, and they didn't do him any good now, beyond that they'd taught him to survive. He learned the lessons those years gave him, and moved on to times those lessons had been necessary.

And then he remembered Harry. Harry who looked so much like James had at thirteen, and Sirius had escaped from that miserable place to kill Harry, and God, hadn't James's death been enough for him? Did he have to go after Harry too, his godson, the person he should have protected and loved above all else? And Harry was such a bright kid, and didn't deserve any of what was going on, but then Remus couldn't keep the nagging thought away that Sirius didn't really either and that Sirius should be happy somehow, though certainly not at the cost of Harry's life and what was Remus supposed to do anyhow? And then, at the end of the year, killing the rat who was responsible for the misery that was Sirius's life for twelve years would have made him happy, and so Remus would have killed Wormtail too. Together, Sirius had said, and in this they were together, even if they hadn't really been before. It didn't matter that Harry had stopped them, because they still had that togetherness, and the rat's escape didn't mean so much except that Sirius couldn't be free and they couldn't keep that togetherness.

The next year was a blur of watching and waiting and wondering, and it was only important because at the end of it Sirius came to see him, had been sent by Dumbledore to live in his house because Dumbledore knew that Remus would care for him. And Remus did--too much, maybe. Because when Sirius went to Grimmauld Place in order to be protected, Remus went with him without having been asked, because he knew that in that house, Sirius would not be able to properly care for himself, and he needed to be cared for more than anyone else Remus knew.

Such bittersweet memories of times in that house, too. Sirius was so different and yet so the same, but the Dementors had taken his happiness away and Grimmauld Place was keeping it away, and the only thing that seemed to help was either when Remus or Harry was around him, and since Harry so often couldn't be, Remus was. Remus was there in the dark of the night when Sirius woke up screaming, and Remus was there to brush the hair back away from his forehead and help him sleep again. Remus was there with a smile whenever he could be, because damn Dumbledore that he couldn't always be, and didn't Dumbledore see that Sirius needed him more than the Order did?

And Sirius needed him more and more, and he was there because maybe he was the only happiness that Sirius could find in that dreadful house and who was he to try and take that away? He didn't even want to take it away, because he wanted to be there and be Sirius's happiness, and Sirius was so desperate, and Remus was too, and they needed each other. Maybe it was love or maybe it was friendship, but Remus was there when Sirius needed him, and if Sirius needed to sleep in his bed to keep the nightmares away, who was he to say no, especially since he wanted it just as much as Sirius did, and needed the comfort that having Sirius sleeping so close to him provided.

And God, maybe it was love or maybe it was friendship, or maybe it was even lust when the comfort became just as much physical as it was emotional, but Remus didn't know and didn't think it had mattered. They just wanted the same things, and if kissing could make them feel alive, if running hands and mouths down bare bodies could make them feel tied to reality and think that they were remembered by each other if no one else, then where was the harm? And if it was Sirius who could make Remus come into his mouth, and Remus who could make Sirius cry out loud in orgasm, well they were closer now, and it made them feel better, and they both liked it and wanted it that way. They knew all too much about the Darkness, and being together in this way gave them back a trace of Light.

Those are sometimes the hardest things to remember, those last months in Grimmauld Place, the last time he had seen Sirius happy or been really happy himself. But the memories are hard to deny, and Remus doesn't even bother to try, because he tells himself that he has more important things to worry about. But even as it's hard, sometimes so hard, to remember, it's even harder to forget, and Remus doesn't think he can.