Bewitched | wolfstar au

Twenty-six

A loud crash pulls Remus out of sleep, forcing a gasp out of his lips. For a moment, he lies still, his mind lagging behind his body even as his eyes fly open.

It's dark.

Darker than it should be... the power's gone out. Remus turns the light switch on anyway, even if it makes no difference.

There's a harsh buzz coming from outside, the noise of incessant rain. It's almost too loud. Remus shakes his head at how fast his heart is beating. "Sirius," he calls into the darkness, reaching for his wand under the pillow. "Sirius?"

No reply.

Remus struggles to locate his wand. "Lumos," he whispers once he manages to pull it out. He doesn't have to thrust the wand further away towards Sirius' bed to see that it's empty.

Shit.

Bracing his wand in front of him, Remus scrambles out of bed. He goes to open the door, but freezes on hearing footsteps.

Shit, shit, shit.

"You're a disgrace in the very name of wizardry, Lupin," he scolds himself, realising with a start that it sounds a lot like something Sirius would say. Not to Remus, of course, but the similarities in phrasing are uncanny. Blinking his eyes a couple times to pull himself together, he takes a step back, holding his illuminated wand pointed at the door.

The footsteps eventually stop, right in front of the door. Sick to his stomach, Remus waits.

When the door opens, it's quiet and careful. Possibly just the way serial murderers would open your bedroom door to minimize chances of struggle, but also possibly the way ridiculously beautiful boys open your bedroom door when they don't want to disturb your sleep.

It's a murderer. With an axe. And a mask.

No, it isn't. It's Sirius Black, of course. Remus feels almost guilty for not considering the possibility of the footsteps he heard being Sirius'.

Remus lowers his wand, and Sirius goes completely still. Everything is bathed in pale blue-white wandlight, but Sirius is mostly reduced to an inky blue silhouette, with the light only barely falling on the angles of his face and throat.

But Remus can't take his eyes off of him anyway, and Sirius doesn't look away either. So they wait like that, hearts pounding and breaths shallow, just looking at each other like you would look at a painting you love. Trying to see every detail you've already memorized, and then looking for more, more, more.

It's a sudden flood of bright light that  pushes them both out of their frozen state. As the power comes back on, Remus squints to block the harsh light out from his unaccustomed eyes. He waves his wand to cancel the spell and tosses it on 'his' bed.

When he opens his eyes again, his blurry vision reveals a ghost-like rendering of the Sirius Black he's used to having around. This is a Sirius of whom Remus has only caught fleeting glimpses, dull and distant, barely present. Remus rubs his eyes to clear his vision.

"Where did you-" He starts to ask, ignoring the tension building in the room. His voice is still hoarse from sleep. But then, his eyes fall on a patch of dark pink on Sirius' cheek. And then another on his jaw.

His knuckles are purple.

Remus has always thought of Sirius in greyscale. And he has always wanted to see him in colour. But not like this. Never like this. It's all wrong, the way the dark patches cloud the surface of his smooth, pale skin, how angry and how bitter they look, so out of place on a boy Remus has always thought of as nothing less than beautiful.

He moves closer, his movements no longer languid from sleep. His hand reaches to touch Sirius' face, but afraid of hurting him, Remus stops himself.

"You got in a fight," he says softly.

"Why, aren't you a real Sherlock?" Sirius grins, and what hurts is not that he's smiling, but only how real it looks. How many times has Remus seen him smile like this? And out of all that, how many times was it real?

"This isn't funny," Remus says, mostly to himself. "You're hurt, Sirius."

"You should see the other guy," Sirius smirks.

Remus shakes his head. "Do you really think I care about that right now?" He says, a little more harshly than he intends to. He pauses to gather himself, and takes Sirius' hands in his, holding them palms down so that the light falls on his bruised knuckles.

"Look what you've done to yourself," he says, not looking at Sirius' face.

"I can fix it," Sirius replies. His voice is light, free of any and all worries in the world.   He speaks again when Remus doesn't answer, and this time, his voice is a little thicker. Like it's carrying some emotion that Remus can't really place. "Remus," Sirius says, "-please. It's nothing I can't fix with a little magic. It's okay."

Remus doesn't point out that no, it's not fucking okay to turn up at God knows what time it is with your face looking like a colour swatch sheet. Instead he tugs Sirius towards his bed.

"Then let me do it for you," He says, one hand still holding Sirius'.

Sirius looks at him for a moment, his eyes shining. He looks down quickly and gives a small nod. Remus nudges him towards the bed. Quietly, they both sit down. A couple waves of Remus' wand later, and the bruises on Sirius' face disappear. The purple of his knuckles fades away, but a faint red remains on his skin.

"Thank you," Sirius says, staring at their hands. Remus keeps his eyes glued on Sirius' lowered eyes, watching how his long lashes tremble. Eventually, they rise back up, but Sirius looks away almost as soon as their eyes meet.

Slowly, the tension builds inside the room as unspoken words and unanswered questions leak out of their heads. The air gets saturated with thick emotion, and when he can't to bear it any longer, Remus shatters the silence.

"Sirius," he chokes out, "Why did you do it?"

Only more silence.

"What happened, Sirius? Who was it?" Remus presses.

"Two people," Sirius says quietly. He looks at Remus' wide eyes and quickly adds, "Not at the same time."

Two people. Remus wonders if there will be more. "Okay," he frowns, "Let's start with the first one. What happened?"

"Peter Pettigrew," Sirius says sharply, like he's throwing those syllables out with force. "I went to have a chat with him, and then I beat him up."

***

A

uthor's Note

I know that this update is long overdue and I'm truly, truly sorry. I just can't deal with myself, everything's so shit. It's always been like this, but most of the time I kind of oscillate between really bad days and really good ones. I don't know why, but these few days, weeks, whichever, they've just been so horrid and I don't know what I'm doing with myself. It doesn't help that I usually write from midnight to four-five in the morning, and that also happens to be when I feel the worst.

Anyway, that doesn't matter. Thank you for your kind words, and still sticking around for updates even if I take so long to write them. You all have a big impact in my life, and I appreciate your patience, support, and enthusiasm.

Love,
Isuri ♡
24 Jun 2020