The Heart of the Matter

December 1^st, 1977, 8.00 a.m.

Sirius sighed as he pulled on his robes, trying to fit his head through the arm. It wasn't Christmas yet.

December 1^st, 1977, 9.00 a.m.

Sirius sighed again, and stabbed his fork mournfully into a plate of bacon. Still not Christmas.

December 1^st, 1977, 10.00 a.m.

Sirius accidentally poked his wand in Lily Evans's hair and turned half of it green. Professor McGonagall took away ten points for carelessness, but Sirius barely noticed. It still wasn't Christmas.

December 1^st, 1977, 11.00 a.m.

Professor McGonagall took away another ten points because Sirius was looking out the window at the snow-less grounds and not paying attention to her lesson. Sirius looked at her soulfully, and she rolled her eyes and said, "No, Mr Black, it is not Christmas yet."

December 1^st, 1977, 12.00 p.m.

Sirius toyed with his fork and ignored the food in front of him; it wasn't very interesting. His gaze drifted above everyone's heads and stopped on the ceiling, where it was obvious that there was no snow. He sighed, again, and slumped down dejectedly in his chair.

"For Heaven's sake, Sirius, it's not going to be Christmas for another twenty-four days," Remus commented from across the table. Beneath it, his foot nudged Sirius, and he smiled. "Stop acting so melancholy."

Sirius flung his arms out dramatically, ignoring James, who scowled to see Sirius's hand suddenly in front of his face. "But Remus!" Sirius protested. "It's twenty-four days! I don't know if I can wait that long..."

"You've always been able to before," Remus replied, "so shut up and eat your vegetables. It's not really that long. You've been waiting all year, haven't you? What's twenty-four days compared to a year?"

"Forever," Sirius muttered petulantly, crossing his arms over his chest. James, now that random limbs were not in the way of his eating, went back to his food. Remus chuckled and nudged Sirius's foot again.

"Christmas is just a holiday, after all. I don't see why you make such a big deal of it..." Remus said in between bites of his own food. Sirius shook his head sadly.

"If you don't know by now," he declared, "there's no point in me trying further to explain." He stuck his nose in the air and glared snobbishly down it at Remus, who was digging into his carrots as if there was nothing better in the world.

"Mmm," Remus agreed, biting at a carrot gently. He took a moment to chew and swallow, then said, "You say that every year."

"Then why do you keep asking?" Sirius finally started eating his own meal.

Remus smiled at him. "I like Christmas too," he said. Sirius smiled back, noticing that it wasn't really an answer, but not really caring.

December 7^th, 1977, 2.23 p.m.

"Do you think," Sirius started, holding up a beaker with lime green potion in it and staring at it critically, "there's a potion to make Christmas come sooner?"

Remus chuckled. "No more than there is a spell, and you asked about that two years ago. I think you'll just have to wait with the rest of us mortals."

"It's not that bad," Peter put in. "Building anticipation and all. Makes you enjoy it more when it finally gets here."

"Unless you've got crap gifts," James muttered darkly. "Then you're just setting yourself up for disappointment."

Sirius glared at him dirtily. "You'd know about that, though, wouldn't you, James?" Sirius said. "Setting yourself up for disappointment, I mean. How many times have you asked Evans out now? Two thousand? And been shot down as many times?"

James looked like he was debating hexing him, then settled for glaring at him. Remus laughed, and slung an arm around Sirius's shoulders. "Christmas will get here when it gets here," he said reasonably. "And not all the gifts we get can be utter crap, so I think you're safe, James. Now if only Sirius can manage to not explode himself waiting..."

Now both James and Sirius were glaring at him, but Remus smiled at them cheerfully.

December 15^th, 1977, 3.15 p.m.

"--n't it obvious?" Sirius heard as he approached a corner. "I'd frankly be surprised if him and Lupin weren't shagging."

What? Sirius thought. /Him/ and Lupin? Who're they talking about, and what's this about Remus and a bloke? He paused to try and hear their conversation better.

Someone snorted. "That's disgusting," a voice commented. "Two blokes? That's just...wrong."

There was a pause, then another voice said, "Besides, everything would be ruined if he were gay. That's like...the best broom on the market, and you're not allowed to ride it. It's criminal."

One of them burst into gales of laughter. "Such an apt analogy," the laugher said. "You really want a ride, don't you, Margaret?" More laughter.

"Oh, shut up," Margaret said sullenly. "Besides, you agree with me, don't you?" She sighed dramatically. "It would be such a waste if he was gay..."

"But he's not," the second voice cut in, "because however much a rebel he likes to be, even he wouldn't do something that..." The girl apparently didn't have a word for it, as she didn't finish her sentence. Sirius frowned. Who were they talking about, and what did this have to do with Remus?

"Anyway," the first girl said loudly, "it does look like he and Lupin are always flirting with each other, doesn't it?"

The second girl sniffed. "I don't think so," she said. "They're just friends, is all. You're making a big deal out of nothing. Now come on, or we'll be late for Charms."

Their voices trailed off as they walked away, but Sirius stood as if rooted to the spot. Remus...someone was flirting with Remus? Some bloke? And Remus was flirting back?

Sirius didn't like that. It gave him a nasty twisty feeling in the pit of his stomach, and he didn't like that at all.

December 15^th, 1977, 8.30 p.m.

Sirius glanced nervously around the common room--no Remus. Good. He went and sat down by James and Peter in their corner, and tried not to think about where Remus was. Off flirting with that bloke? a voice inside him whispered. Sirius told the voice succinctly to shut up.

"James," he said in a low voice, glancing around the room again to make sure no one was listening. "Hey James, I need your help."

James went on writing his essay, though Peter looked up. "Go ahead," James said, his quill practically flying over the parchment. "I'm listening."

James sure didn't look like he was listening. "Oh for--give that here," he said, grabbing the quill from James's hand. "Listen to me, will you? I need to know something."

James rolled his eyes, but sat back in his chair and appeared to give Sirius his every attention. "Go on, then," he said, when Sirius hesitated.

Grumbling to himself, Sirius decided to just go ahead and ask straight out. "Do you know if there's this bloke that Remus flirts with?" he asked bluntly.

James and Peter stared at him for a moment, then burst into laughter. Other people in the common room looked at their corner, but Sirius glared at them, and they went back to whatever they were doing.

"Oi, I'm serious!" he hissed, leaning forward and glaring at the two of them. "And don't you dare make that joke."

James wiped tears of laughter away from his cheeks. "Oh, I'm sure you are, Padfoot," James said weakly, chuckles still taking him every several seconds. "But don't you realize how funny that question is?"

Sirius crossed his arms. "No," he said, scowling. "Just answer it, Potter."

James finally seemed to get his laughter under control. "Isn't it obvious?" he asked, and ignored Sirius's scowl. "Honestly, Padfoot, I'm surprised you didn't notice yourself." At that, Peter dissolved into chuckles again, and Sirius sent a dark glare in his direction as well. "But," James continued, "you never were good at seeing things right in front of your nose..."

"Out with it, Potter!" Sirius growled.

James flapped a hand at him and complied. "Yes, Sirius, there is indeed a bloke that Remus flirts with." James snickered.

There was silence for a moment. "Well?" Sirius said impatiently. "Who is it?"

James leaned back in his chair, stretching lanky legs in front of him. He gave Sirius a slow smile. "Why, Padfoot," he asked lazily, "why does it matter? You intend to go defend his honor, or something?"

Sirius snorted. "As if he needs me for that," he scoffed, and thrust down the feeling inside him that rather liked the idea of defending Remus's honor. He really doesn't need it, he told that feeling inside himself, but he didn't think it listened. "I'm just curious."

James raised an eyebrow. "Or jealous, maybe?"

Sirius shifted in his seat. "What...?" he said, shaking his head. "I don't know what you're talking about. How about you just tell me?"

James yawned. "Right, whatever." He stood up, then looked at Sirius, his eyes glinting mischievously behind his glasses. "You."

Then he walked off, leaving Sirius gaping after him. What...?

December 16^th, 1977, 1.23 a.m.

"I don't know why you're so surprised," Remus said lightly, and kissed the hollow of Sirius's throat. Sirius swallowed hard. "I mean, isn't it obvious that you flirt with me all the time?"

Sirius knew he was going to grow really tired of the words "isn't it obvious", and sooner rather than later. "You flirt back, I believe," Sirius reminded Remus. Remus laughed, and started placing teasing kisses all down Sirius's chest.

"Of course," he said, from his position above Sirius's belly. "Could you imagine me doing this if I didn't?" His kisses turned into soft nips, and Sirius felt something in his stomach tighten.

"Probably," Sirius said, trying to ignore what the boy between his legs was doing, and not succeeding very well. "Having Lily hate him didn't stop James from his fantasies."

Remus wrinkled his nose. "Really, Padfoot, bringing Lily and James into it now? Want an orgy, do you?" He bent down and placed a kiss right--there. Sirius groaned.

"No," Sirius said, trying desperately to hold onto his thoughts when Remus had his lips around the him like that. "But I don't want this to be a dream, either."

Remus lifted his head. "Padfoot..."

Then it all faded away.

December 16^th, 1977, 1.45 a.m.

Sirius lay in bed, breathing hard, trying and failing not to remember how good that dream felt. He groaned and hid his head beneath his pillow. It was all James's fault! If he hadn't planted the idea in Sirius's head...

Sirius immediately resolved to say nothing of this to Remus, and went back to sleep.

December 20^th, 1977, 6.38 p.m.

Not that Remus was making things very easy for him.

Blasted carrots. Why did the way Remus had his lips around a carrot have to remind Sirius of how Remus had lips around Sirius himself in the dream? And why, for heaven's sake, did he have to be getting jealous of a carrot?

"This isn't happening," Sirius muttered to himself, and sunk lower in his seat, trying to look at anything but Remus.

"Padfoot?" Remus bit off some of the carrot and chewed quickly, swallowing and then giving his friend a considering look. "Are you all right?"

"Fine, fine." If you only knew the half of it. "Just...just...waiting for it to be Christmas," he said lamely.

Remus looked at him sharply, but let the excuse go. "Only just over four days," he commented, and went back to eating his carrot. Lips around the carrot.

Sirius whimpered, very, very quietly, and if Remus noticed, he didn't say anything.

December 22^nd, 1977, 2.13 a.m.

Muscled legs wrapped around his waist. Hands gripping his shoulders almost hard enough to bruise. His own hands, holding tightly to the thighs of his partner. Lifting one hand to brush sweaty brown hair away from an equally sweaty forehead. Slumping down next to him in the bed when he'd finished, and brown eyes opening to look at him, lips curving to smile at him. Remus's eyes. Remus's smile.

Sirius woke to his own harsh breathing and wet pyjamas, and relaxed back against his pillow. He didn't know how much more of that he could take--he had to tell Remus. Remus was supposedly flirting back with him, wasn't he? Remus would take hearing that his friend had wet dreams about him well, wouldn't he?

Sirius felt doomed.

December 22^nd, 1977, 8.33 a.m.

Sirius propped his head up on a fist and tried not to fall asleep in his scrambled eggs. It had taken hours to get to sleep again after he'd waken up with Remus's taste in his mouth, Remus's face in his mind, Remus everywhere around him, and he was tired.

"You all right, Sirius?" Peter asked, around a mouthful of bacon. Sirius just nodded sleepily.

"Up all night waiting for Christmas?" Remus asked, raising an eyebrow and grinning at him. Sirius blinked at him--that grin. Those lips. Those lips around his--

"I think something else was keeping him up," James said loudly, though not loud enough to draw attention to their little group. He cast an arch look at Sirius, a knowing glint in his eyes, and Sirius mentally cursed James with every word he knew. Conniving bastard.

"Just didn't sleep well," Sirius said, glaring at James. "Nothing specific kept me up." Nothing but Remus, so warm, soft and hard at the same time, and just so, so warm--

As he started to harden, Sirius immediately thanked Hogwarts for requiring robes, and resolved to stop thinking about those stupid dreams. Maybe they'd stop after he told Remus.

But then, he'd have the real thing. He wouldn't need dreams. He wouldn't.

Sirius closed his eyes and dug his fork into his eggs. Remus flirted with him back--Sirius had been watching and paying attention, and now that he knew what to look for, he knew flirting when he saw it.

Now the only question was, when to tell him? It had to be soon; Sirius didn't think he could keep the secret himself much longer, and besides, he was impatient. He wanted to kiss Remus in reality, not just in dreams. He even thought he was looking more forward to that than to Christmas.

He'd think about it more when he wasn't so tired.

December 23^rd, 1977, 11.47 p.m.

"Sirius." A breathy little whisper in his ear.

"Sirius." Spoken to the vicinity of his neck, followed immediately by hot kisses on his skin.

"Sirius." Just before lips and teeth closed gently around a nipple.

"Sirius." In the middle of a tongue laving his belly.

"Remus." Spoken to the night air as Sirius breathed in deeply, blinking away the dream. Just a dream. Just...a dream.

New Year's. New Year's was soon enough, wasn't it? New year, new relationships, new...everything.

Yes. Sirius turned over in his bed. New Year's was perfect.

December 25^th, 1977, 9.54 a.m.

New Year's was not perfect. New Year's was an impossibility. New Year's was a disaster waiting to happen.

Sirius couldn't wait that long.

Watching Remus smile and laugh as his friends piled present after present on him, watching him gently caressing the wrapping paper before starting to delicately tear it, watching his eyes light up as the gift within was revealed...

Sirius couldn't wait until New Year's to tell this smiling, laughing boy that he...

That he...

Sirius pondered for a moment, wondering what exactly he was going to tell Remus. That he wanted him? No--Sirius had wanted plenty of people before, and he didn't want to put Remus into that category. That he liked him as more than a friend? Sirius snorted silently--that seemed a bit of a silly thing to say, and didn't quite get to the heart of the matter.

And the heart of the matter was... Sirius closed his eyes and let out a long sigh. The heart of the matter was indeed the heart--his heart, to be precise. He thought he was in love with Remus--no, he knew he was in love with Remus--and he wasn't sure what he thought about it. Or, for that matter, what Remus would think about it. There was a big difference between flirting and love...

Well, the only way to know how Remus felt would be to ask him. Soon. Before Sirius could talk himself out of it.

And after the presents.

James was laughing too, and Peter was grinning as he unwrapped one present to see a large box of Honeydukes' chocolates, courtesy of his mother.

This was what he loved about Christmas, and especially Christmas at Hogwarts. Regulus, the little worm, was a Slytherin and therefore couldn't disturb him here. Nor could his mother ruin this content feeling he always got with her sighs of disappointment every time she opened his gift of embroidered silk lace handkerchiefs--it wasn't his fault he couldn't think of anything else for her!--or by glaring daggers at him when he dared look disappointed at opening his own gifts from her of expensive clothing and uninteresting books.

Christmas here had his friends, his brothers, and couldn't be ruined by his relatives. And, Sirius thought as Remus winked at him, maybe Remus knew it, and laughed all the longer for it.

December 25^th, 1977, 6.50 p.m.

Sirius grabbed Remus's sleeve as he went past. "Sirius?" Remus asked, though he obligingly stood back with Sirius as James and Peter went down the stairs before them.

Peter looked back at them and raised an eyebrow, as if asking what they were waiting for. "We'll catch up later," Sirius promised, his hand still holding onto Remus's sleeve. Peter nodded, and hurried down the stairs.

"Sirius?" Remus asked again, and tugged his sleeve from Sirius's grasp. "Sirius, we'll miss the feast."

"We can get something from the house-elves later," Sirius said, and closed the door, leaving them alone in the dorm. "There's something I want to tell you."

Remus turned to face him, crossing his arms over his chest and raising an eyebrow. "All right, then," he said. "What is it?"

"I..." Sirius opened his mouth, then closed it and swallowed. "I..."

"Sirius?" Remus prompted gently. "Is something wrong?"

Sirius ran a hand through his hair. "No," he said, then muttered, "Buggerit, I don't know what--" Remus uncrossed his arms and put a hand on his shoulder, and Sirius stopped.

"You can tell me anything you need to, you know that, right?" Remus said.

Sirius smiled. "Yeah," he said. "I know."

Something swirled in Remus's eyes, something gold amidst the brown. Sirius wanted to get a better look at it, and leaned closer. Remus's eyes widened, and he looked up at Sirius, almost with surprise, but not quite. Then Sirius made the mistake of gazing slightly down, at Remus's lips, and even though he knew it was very obvious that his eyes were focussed on Remus's lips, he couldn't bring himself to glance away. They looked very soft. Slightly chapped, but still very soft. Sirius licked his own lips.

"Sirius," Remus whispered, those lips forming the syllables that made up his name, and Sirius liked looking at that. At the way they curved around the name, at the way Remus's tongue poked out slightly when he said it, at the way Sirius could just see the flash of white teeth inside Remus's mouth when he opened it.

They were very close now, Sirius noted absently. About close enough to comfortably lean just that little bit forward, close enough for their lips to meet--

Apparently Remus was thinking the same thing, for when Sirius raised his eyes to meet Remus's again, he found them gazing at where Sirius's own lips were. Then Remus flicked his eyes up towards Sirius's, he gave a choked-off little laugh, and all of a sudden he was pressing against him, their bodies close together, their lips on each other's.

Sirius felt, for a moment, as if his brain was going to stop. It was definitely Remus who crossed that last distance, he knew. And it was definitely Remus whose hands were clenched in Sirius's robes, whose body was leaning heavily against Sirius's, whose lips were pressed insistently against Sirius's. And Sirius would have thought about the significance of that, of what Remus was doing, but then he let his brain stop and concentrate on /what/ Remus was doing. On the way his hands were moving up from Sirius's robes to Sirius's hair, on the way their bodies fit together, on the way Remus's mouth opened against Sirius's and their tongues tangled together. On the way they brushed against each other, sending lightning straight down Sirius's spine. Sirius was hard, and Remus was as hard as Sirius.

Then finally they broke apart, both breathing heavily.

"Well," Remus said carefully. "Was that along the lines of whatever it was you wanted to tell me?"

Sirius stared at him for a moment--and then started to laugh. Remus looked at him uncertainly as he bent over wheezing, clutching his stomach, his laughter ringing out through the dorm. Every time he thought he would stop, one glance up at Remus again--lips slightly swollen from their kiss, robes rucked up from Sirius's hands, startled expression on his face--would set him off again.

It took several minutes, but Sirius got control of himself, and looked up at Remus from his position on the floor. "Get down here," he said, still feeling a bit silly. He grabbed Remus's hand and tugged, and Remus, who did not appear to be expecting anything of the sort, went straight down and landed half in Sirius's lap.

Remus scrambled up on his knees, gazing at Sirius's a little wildly. "What was that for?" he asked indignantly. Sirius grinned.

"I didn't want to hurt my neck, looking up at you," he said casually. His grin soon called an answering one from Remus, and Remus started chuckling and shaking his head.

"What am I going to do with you?" he sighed, but Sirius could see he was still grinning.

"Well," Sirius said. His mouth went suddenly dry, and he swallowed. "You could always...kiss me again."

Remus looked up at him sharply, the grin gone from his face. "Could I?" he asked quietly, his eyes gazing intently into Sirius's.

Sirius swallowed again. "You could," he said. "I mean, if you wanted to. And anything else you wanted."

"Anything else I wanted," Remus repeated, his eyes slightly wide. Looking at him, Sirius remembered his dreams, and nodded. Anything he wants. "And if I wanted...you?"

Sirius had no doubts about what he meant. "Anything you want," he said again. "But..." he looked at his watch, "not right now. James and Peter might be suspicious if we don't come down to the feast at all, you know."

Remus smiled, then looked down. "But later?" he prompted. Sirius grinned, reaching out a hand and lifting his chin up, then leaning forward and planting a swift kiss on Remus's mouth.

"Later," he promised. "After James and Peter are asleep, you can unwrap your last gift."

The sound of Remus's laughter, and the feeling of his hand in Sirius's as they walked together down to the Great Hall, was one of the reasons why Sirius loved Christmas so much.