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If Remus Lupin could ever be honest with himself, he would know why he was pursuing
the friendship of his Potions lab partner. He was willing to confront his own feelings of
guilt about the ways that his best friends had bullied the other boy. He could see that
house rivalries were stupid and meaningless. But the idea that he could have sexual desire
for another boy was not something he was willing to entertain. Even if he were, the
thought that it might be the ugly outcast with an enormous nose wasn't one he would
have allowed space in his well-organized sixteen-year-old brain.
No, when he thought about why he was being extra kind and attentive to Severus Snape,
Remus Lupin said things to himself like "He's a bit of an awkward fellow" and "Really
deserves better than all that bullying." Sometimes he would go so far as "He's been quite
decent about my miserable potion making."
Though he was a teenager, Remus was capable of more subtlety than one might expect.
He didn't stalk Snape, he didn't extend himself to make small talk with him in the
classroom--he didn't act differently toward him than he did toward anyone else. He
greeted him by name in the halls and said "How are you?" That in itself was enough,
since everyone else either ignored Snape or actively teased him. Snape noticed the way
Remus was trying to be kind to him, and it confused him.
Snape knew that Lupin felt guilty about the way that Potter and Black had humiliated him
in front of most of the school at the end of fifth-year. He didn't even want to be lab
partners with Lupin because of it. He had perhaps permanently alienated Lily Evans, his
former Potions bench partner, by blurting out a stupid racist slur when she tried to defend
him from the bullies in her house. He was still trying to puzzle out what he should do
about that. He didn't want her to know how much it bothered him that she might not
forgive him, and he would be humiliated. But it did bother him. It felt cowardly.
On this particular day, Snape was sitting under a tree on the Hogwarts grounds. He had
warded the area as best he could. Nothing better for incipient paranoia than a little gang
of students who are out to get you. He pulled out his journal. Good, it hadn't been
disturbed. Severus knew that he was taking a risk, recording his thoughts. The journal
was spelled shut so that only his command could open it. It was glamoured to look like
his notes for a class on runes. If that glamour was ever penetrated, his writing would
appear in Catalan rather than in English. Even so, he felt it a bit risky.
The problem with the study of potions, he wrote, is its basis in the idea that
everything has an essential nature based on its constituent parts. By analogy one could
come to believe that people have essential natures, good or evil, that come from their
genetic background. This is what most people in my House believe, perhaps in part
because our Head of House is the Potions Master.
I waver on this question. Potion making and its theory come naturally to me, and I tend to
judge people according to those habits of mind. Considering the point carefully, however,
I see that the mania for Pureblood superiority doesn't measure intelligence, worth or
magical power. Evans, my only competition in Potions class, is muggle born. She is
intelligent and brave and deeply concerned with ethical questions. She is a much better
human being than Potter, who is an arrogant, pureblooded bully. Her essential nature isn't
the sum of her component parts, or her genetics, or what have you.
Most of the people I know at Hogwarts are children of mixed parentage anyway, as I am.
Children don't inherit their parents' powers. Yet I find myself constantly comparing my
classmates to their parents, noticing that the powerful students are the children of
purebloods.
A funny thing about Severus Snape was how rational his voice was when he wrote. You
would never guess that he was a seething cauldron of feelings from his writing. Even he
could recognize the irony, with his limited self-knowledge. He did it on purpose. Writing
was calming, and he could pretend to be that extremely reasonable, well-spoken person
he was imitating. He wished he did have this self-control, this educated voice, when he
spoke.
But when he saw the figure of another student coming toward him, he muttered "bugger!"
It was Lupin. Quickly he lowered the wards. The only thing more dreadful than being
caught unawares without magical protection was being caught overdoing things, as
though he were afraid. Embarrassing. He thought he'd had enough humiliation at
Hogwarts to last him through the rest of his life.
"Hullo, Severus," Lupin said. He was trying to seem casual, though he'd actually walked
a bit out of his usual route when he saw Snape's distinctive profile under the tree.
"What are you, er, revising today? Oh, Runes, is it?"
Of course, out of the whole school, Remus Lupin was the only boy who actually liked
Runes. Damn. Now he's going to try to engage me in small talk about Runes. Why
does he do this?
"Did you read the, er, chapter on sigils of protection?"
"What? Are you trying to catch me doing something Dark?"
"No, er…I didn't know that runes could be used for Dark purposes."
"Anything that can be used to compel someone to do something is Dark, Lupin." He
glares at the other boy from under his eyebrows.
"Er, yes, right. Jolly good." Lupin began to back away.
"Sod off then, Lupin" Snape muttered under his breath.
One of the fellows in his neighborhood growing up was sent to a Quaker or Rosicrucian
school, something like that, Snape remembered. He was a behavior problem in the local
grammar school, so they sent him to this posh school. He was bright enough but the other
students were all middle class or even landed gentry and mocked his accent and his
working-class manners.
"One day," the local boy told his friends, "I had enough of that. One of them, the son of a
Labour Party MP who had been knighted, starting having a go at me, in the way they do.
They goad you with insults so the rest have an excuse to help thrash you. He started up
with snide comments, again, as usual, and I bloodied his nose for him. I bashed his head
against the gymnasium floor, must have been fifteen times."
"Did he cry?"
"Oh no. Finally he looked up and said, 'You working-class chaps are all so physical.' So I
thumped him again."
They all laughed.
Snape wasn't even meant to be listening to the story. He was never quite welcome to hang
about the other boys his age. If he was quiet and didn't say anything, they tolerated him.
Since he was thirteen, it got a bit better. He started smoking and they bummed fags off
him. He leaned against the wall and didn't look at anyone, and just was there.
He figured when he got to Hogwarts that no one would care about class, but of course
they cared everywhere. "Jolly good," he mocked Lupin to himself. "Silly arse." He hated
them all: muggles and purebloods, working class toughs and middle class arseholes.
It was impossible for Snape to recapture the posh voice of his journal at this point. He felt
divided. Everyone in Slytherin house was either a pureblood aristocratic type or
pretended to be one. He had mainly pretended, but it hadn't worked. He never fit in at
home and he didn't fit in here.
Lupin is actually a decent fellow, Snape admitted to himself. A bit of a
coward and a prat for always going along with his friends. He looked so guilty and
uncomfortable with them all the time. Maybe he just felt guilty about things. He was that
kind of person, the kind who feels guilty and doesn't act. Lupin had the posh accent and
the self-control Snape admired, but Snape despised the way it looked on him. But if
he wants to be kind to me, why shouldn't I let him? It's not as though anyone else is.
But he wants something, doesn't he, Shape's inner voice told him. What could he
want from me? Is it going to be another prank? If he wanted to hurt me, he could have
drawn a wand on me just now.
They're all afraid of him, though. They never attack except in a group, he's noticed. Lupin
was nervous, but he didn't have a wand out. He didn't seem hostile, either.
They do stupid things with their magic, anyway. Showing a person's underwear, or using
magic to make people smell like shit, why even bother? True, Snape has been humiliated
by these pranks himself, but he thought, they could have beaten me instead of hexing
me, they could have taken off my clothes by force, and it would be the same result. But
it's not cool to do it by hand. Arseholes.
Why not use magic for something really gory, like magical stab wounds, then? Snape
used to admire one of the lads at home who carried a shiv in his sock. Couldn't do that
here, of course.
This doesn't tell him anything about Lupin's intentions though. Well, he could just keep a
hand on his wand all the time. If Lupin was a decoy for the other three, Snape would be
ready. If Lupin was after something else, he'd just have to figure that out as he went
along.
In the meantime, Remus Lupin was back inside the castle and completely bewildered.
What the hell just happened there? Why did Snape get angry with me for observing
that he was studying Runes? He's so strange. I guess I was trying to impress him, a bit,
with having done the homework ahead. I like Runes, I never get to talk about that with
anyone. I was hoping that since Snape is a studious sort, like me, we might get to talk
about some real things. He climbed the stairs toward the common room, and the
other Marauders.
Well, he doesn't have much of a reason to trust me. I knew that. It's going to take a bit
of patience to draw him out. If I'm very kind to him, he'll be suspicious, but if I just keep
treating him like I would anyone…
Oh God no, they're at it again. Someone had the idiotic idea that Sirius and James
should see Monty Python and the Holy Grail over the summer, and they'd started reciting
whole scenes from the movie in Gryffindor common room every evening.
"I'm not dead yet." Sirius squeaked in a silly voice. "I feel happy!"
"Oh God, can't you please stop it!" Remus said under his breath. James grabbed him by
the neck and began to mess up his hair. "James, please!"
"What's happened, didn't you work off some of this during Quidditch practice?" Remus
looked at Peter. Peter had learned a charm that allowed him to bounce off the floor and
not return right away. Sometimes his friends were very annoying. Remus headed up the
stairs to the dormitory, as James began to recite "You silly k…nigets! I wave my private
parts at your auntie!"
He shut the door behind him, crawled into his bed and pulled the curtains shut. I'm
freezing, he thought, pulling the blankets over him and the pillow over his head.
In a minute maybe I'll wank or something. But in a minute Remus was asleep, too
tired to even put a hand under his testicles. It had only been two days since the last full
moon.
"Oi, Moony, don't miss supper!" He woke to Sirius yanking back the curtain and gently
shaking him by his shoulder. "All right there, mate?"
He knew he looked like hell again. "I'm coming down, wait a minute." Remus tried
casting a charm so it wouldn't look like he'd been sleeping in his clothes, but he was not
very good at that one. Fine. He was a boy, what difference did it make.
Snape was watching for Lupin, for some reason, and saw him enter the Great Hall late.
Gods he looks bad. If we were back in Spinner's End, I'd be wondering if he were on
heroin.
Maybe he is on heroin. Look at him. He's really thin, his face is pale, he has dark circles
under his eyes. He looks like he's about to nod off. It's either heroin or some wizarding
potion that's just like it. Snape never thought about that, but of course you could
synthesize the effects of addictive drugs using magic. I bet I could cook something up
and sell it. Plenty of people in my house would buy it.
Maybe that's what he wants from me: drugs. He examined Remus as carefully as he
could without being noticed. Maybe I can help him get off of them, the poor sod.
There's got to be some kind of methadone potion. Of course he'd have to pay me
somehow, I wouldn't just do it for free.
Remus looked up and saw Snape watching him. Well, at least he doesn't look totally
hostile and paranoid. He seems to be…considering something. What if he's figured out
that I'm a werewolf? The fact that his dorm mates figured it out wasn't so surprising,
as they were actually with him all the time, and he knew they were his friends before they
told him they knew about his lycanthropy. He had a brief moment of panic and then
slowed his breathing and calmed himself down. He would look very hostile and
paranoid if he had figured it out. Maybe he's considering talking to me, or something.
Ha!
He was surprised when Severus actually did stop to talk with him on the way out of the
hall.
"Lupin, are you planning to study for Runes this evening?"
"Yes, I was going to use the library. Because of the dictionaries." I suppose it wasn't
necessary to say why I was planning to be in the library. I mean, of course. He's going to
think I'm an idiot.
"Would you mind some company?"
"No, not at all, that would be…that would be nice." He was about to say "delightful" but
realized that Snape would feel mocked. Wow, that was really suave, "would you like
some company"! Maybe the suavest thing he has heard out of Snape's mouth, ever.
Snape was also amazed at himself. He meant to be threatening, like he knew Remus'
secret, and instead he sounded friendly. Well, all right. He would have an opportunity to
ask some questions while they studied.
At 8:30, Snape found Lupin at the back of the library. Remus had spread his things out on
one of the tables and beckoned to Snape, though he's the only one there. On a stack of
parchment, Remus had begun making notes and drawing the runes.
Coming around the table to look at Lupin's work, Snape asked "Do you mind?"
"No, go ahead."
Snape had finally hit his adolescent growth spurt over the summer, and from his new
height had to squat to bring himself to the same level with the seated Remus. To brace
himself, he put an arm around the back of Remus' chair. His head, still damp from the
shower, was level with Remus'. Remus felt himself blushing, and…getting hard? What
the hell? He slid one of the books into his lap as surreptitiously as possible. It's just
because I was too tired to masturbate this afternoon. It's pathetic to be a teenaged boy.
Snape surreptitiously checked out Lupin's arms for track marks, but saw none.
Though I suppose if it's a potion that duplicates heroin, he might not inject it. His
arms were not as thin and wasted as he expected. He was actually surprisingly muscular,
but his face looked exhausted. Maybe I'm wrong about the drugs thing. I don't want to
make an arse of myself. I'll just keep my eyes open and see what he does. After all, if he
wants to get drugs from me he'll have to let on, eventually.
Remus devoted his attention to drawing a rune. He didn't examine his desire to impress
Severus with his runes skills, but he knew he drew them well. At least this way he
wouldn't have to talk and say something foolish.
"Is that meant to be mawnaz?" Snape said abruptly.
"Meant to be?"
"Your writing is almost like calligraphy."
"Thank you."
"It's not a compliment. Doesn't that change how you project magic into them? You are
putting too much effort into making them…pretty."
"It's not that much effort. I don't think it affects the magic. We could practice."
"Do you know the Sigil Game?" Snape takes a chair next to him.
"No, what's that?"
"You open the runes book and choose a rune charm at random, then I'll do the same and
we'll see what happens. Don't they play that in Gryffindor?"
"No, I've never heard of it. What do you mean, at random?"
"I mean, pick one, don't translate it-- just draw it."
"Do they work without intention?"
"If you do them correctly, supposedly they do. We'll find out."
They put a dictionary upright between them as a screen. Remus, ever honorable in games
with rules, had chosen, at random, a rune he does not recognize. Snape, ever cagey, had
selected a rune charm before their meeting, one that is to make enemies reveal their
secrets. After Remus had cast a charm to dry the ink, they exchanged parchment.
The color drained out of Remus' face.
"What's wrong?" Snape asked. Does he really know them all that well?
"Did you intentionally pick the rune to make enemies reveal secrets?" He does!
Lupin could see that Snape was impressed, but he felt both too worried and too hurt to
care. He tried to cover the worry by looking up the rune Snape drew in the back of the
book.
"Oh, see, you're off by just a little…" Remus could hear the intense relief in his own
voice. "Look, you've drawn another similar one?" He flipped the page, and blushed.
"Your rune is actually closer to the one to make a lover reveal his or her feelings."
"What?" Snape looked surprised before he remembered that he shouldn't.
Remus felt himself flush. "Did you do it on purpose? Do you really think I'm your
enemy?"
"Oh, come on, Lupin. I just wanted to know why you're being so nice to me."
"You are such a paranoid bastard, Snape!"
"I thought maybe…"
"What?"
"Do you…do you have a drugs habit?"
"What? No! Why did you think that?" Lupin was smiling, looking relieved.
"Because you're terribly thin and pale, you always look exhausted, and you are out of
class with some illness or other all the time. I thought maybe…you wanted me to help
you get a fix."
"It's not as though you look so healthy yourself! Why would I come to you to get a fix?"
"I'm good with potions, and also…"
"Also?"
"When I'm home on holiday I could get them."
"What, are there are a lot of illegal Muggle drugs where you live?" Lupin laughed.
"Why, where do you think I live?"
"On some grand estate for wizard aristocrats somewhere."
"It's a bit more like a council estate, for Muggles."
"Oh."
"My parents own their own house, it's just…it's a bit rough there. An old mill town. A lot
of men made redundant, a lot of people on the dole." Why was he even telling him this?
Is it something to do with the rune spells? Snape scowled, unconsciously clamping his
lips shut.
"Oh, I never would have guessed that, not from the way you talk or anything. Do
you…would you like to see what I've drawn? I really did pick it at random so I'm not
sure, we'll have to look it up." He didn't like the way Snape looked so chagrined.
Lupin's sigil was perfect, no mistaking what it was. It was a sigil to make a man fall in
love with another man.
"Ah, so that's what you want. I knew it was something. Awfully decent of you, old chap,
not to just pull me in the showers." Snape teased Lupin with his fake posh accent.
"No, Severus, I didn't mean…I didn't cheat."
"It's all right Lupin. Can't say I think much of your taste, old man." He leered at the
blushing boy and laughed.
Remus laughed too because he couldn't help it. He drew a sigil to make Snape fall in love
with him! I guess this makes us even. He's never going to let me live this down.
"Really, Severus, I didn't do it on purpose, " he said as seriously as he could, before they
both began laughing again.
"Well of course you didn't. After all, it's not as though you would be attracted to old
Snivvy." Snape kept up the fake accent, but Remus could hear tightness behind his
joking.
"Oh, you're not so…I mean…"
"Are you queer then, Lupin?" Snape said in his normal voice, and moved closer to him.
"I didn't think so, but I suppose I might be…" he said breathlessly. What did I just
say? Oh this is absurd, are we going to… Snape leaned toward him, and smoothly
tipped Remus' chin toward him with one finger, and then kissed him, full on the mouth, a
soundless, gentle kiss. Snape knows how to kiss! I had no idea! He didn't even bump
our noses together!
"Your sigil worked, I think, Severus." He looked right at Snape, who ducked his head. "I
didn't know…
"What?"
"I had no idea that I…that I felt this." Then Remus imitated what Severus did, turning the
other boy to face him. He didn't kiss him right away, but looked into his eyes. He thought
of Snape as being kind of beady-eyed, but he could see up close that this was not
accurate. His eyes were large, with long dark eyelashes, and the irises a beautiful dark
brown color. Remus saw his reflection in the other boy's eyes, his mouth open.
Then he kissed Snape, trying to kiss as perfectly as the first time. But Snape parted his
lips this time, bringing his arms around Remus. Oh, the feeling of their tongues touching
almost overwhelmed Remus. Remus hadn't even done this with a girl before. The closest
he'd come to real snogging was a kissing game at a party, and he was too embarrassed
then to do more than smack his lips against the girl's. She was quite pretty, with a plump
figure he liked, and sweet and clearly liked him.
Now I'm snogging this ugly sarcastic boy instead and I think I might faint!
Severus moved to kiss his cheek and his jaw and his neck and oh good God his ear!
"Oh my God, where did you learn to do that?"
"Snogging girls." Snape said quietly. "They do it better than boys."
"Oh." Remus felt a bit foggy now, like he couldn't think. He tried to move closer to
Snape, feeling an involuntary desire to rub against him. The library was deserted, but
Remus was suddenly afraid he would have an orgasm right here from having his earlobe
licked like that. Just when he began to moan quietly, Severus stopped.
"You had no idea." Severus said in a low voice near his ear. "I think that means it was
your rune charm that worked, not mine."
"What?" Remus, panting from the kisses, couldn't immediately understand what Snape
was saying. "Oh. You mean it worked on me? Did my charm work on me, and yours on
you as well? Does that mean this isn't real?"
"It means it's Dark."
"Oh. It doesn't feel Da…oh. You mean the rune charms are making us feel something we
wouldn't. It's making us do something, so it's Dark."
"That's what I mean. I probably shouldn't tell you that because you would be willing
to…do anything with me right now." His voice buzzed in a low register next to Remus'
ear, and warm breath blew across the damp earlobe. Remus couldn't breathe, couldn't
believe he could be this hard. Whatever "anything" was, he was willing.
"Oh, yes. Oh Severus, yes." Severus felt him shiver and broke the embrace, leaning back
to look at him, unsmiling and serious.
"But you might hate me afterward. You might not really be queer, you know."
"Or you might not be."
"No, Lupin, I don't think that's a question. I've snogged girls but I'm queer. I like boys."
"Oh." He's brave, Remus thought suddenly, maybe nonsensically. "But you might
not, er, fancy me. Really. So we have to destroy the runes, or we won't be acting under
our own free will."
He looks disappointed, not angry with me, Snape thought. I shouldn't have
told him though.
Without waiting for Snape's response, Remus picked up the two pieces of parchment—
Snape's, too—and cast a careful "Incendio!" on them in the metal wastebasket by their
table. The signs flamed up and disappeared, staying in the air a minute after the paper
was gone.
Remus looked at Snape carefully. "Could you, er, kiss me again? Just to see."
"Just to see? The librarian is going to come because you set those on fire." Snape knew
this was not true; he had cast a distraction spell to hide them from the librarian and
anyone else in the library, because he thought he might be doing a drug deal with Lupin.
Convenient, that.
"Please?" Looking curiously at Snape, Remus realized that he could just kiss him. So he
did, his own mouth opening and sliding wetly against the other boy's. Oh. It's still
incredible. Remus broke the kiss to whisper, "I think I'm still willing to do…anything
with you right now."
"I…I think I'm not."
"Oh." Remus looked crushed, but tried to put a brave face on it. "I suppose…I suppose it
was just the charm then, making you fancy me like that. Well, can we still… can we still
revise the runes chapter together?" Moving their chairs slightly apart, he tried not to look
at Snape.
Snape was utterly shocked. "Why?"
"Well, I'd like to understand what happened just now, for one thing. I do need to
understand more about how rune charms work."
"But you can do that on your own, or back in your common room. You don't have to do
that with me."
"Yes, but I'd like to."
"Why?"
"I like the way you think about things, Severus."
"You don't have to say that, Lupin."
"Why do you think I kept trying to talk with you?"
"I figured you wanted something. Either because you felt guilty about how your friends
bullied me, or because maybe I could do something for you."
"Like getting me my drugs!" He laughed again.
"Or like having one off with me."
"Well, I do feel guilty, that's true, and apparently I do want to have one off with you,
though I wasn't really aware of my motivations." Remus looked embarrassed, but
plunged ahead. "That wasn't how I was thinking about it. I thought it would be great to
have a friend who actually likes to study. It's so uncool, in Gryffindor, to be enthusiastic
about schoolwork. They act like we're studying something boring! This is a school for
magic! All our subjects are about magic! There's nothing boring about that."
"So you just wanted to be friends with me because…"
"Because I just wanted to be friends. The bullying is horrid and the house rivalry is stupid
and you seem so intelligent and brave and you care about things and you don't mind
whether other people like you and I really like you, Snape."
It came out in a rush and Snape heard the sincerity in it, not least because Remus Lupin
slipped up and called him by his surname. All that careful use of "Severus" didn't seem
right.
"Oh." Severus Snape said. "Oh." He couldn't even achieve his normal ironic tone much
less say something intelligent.
"So it really doesn't matter to me if we don't snog or whatever, even though that was
completely brilliant, maybe it was just from the runes or something, I just…I was looking
forward to talking things over with you."
"This is…you…"
"I know you don't trust me, and I don't blame you, my friends act like arseholes
sometimes, but I wish you could give me a bit of a chance, you know."
"I…all right."
"All right?"
"Yes."
"Now," he said, smiling involuntarily, "I'd like to learn the theory behind how rune spells
work."
At 11:00, Remus came stumbling into the Gryffindor common room.
Sirius and James were still at it, singing "We're knights of the Round Table, We fight
when'e'er we're able…we la la la, la la la, impersonate Clark Gable!"
"Oh my sainted aunt, have you been doing this all night?" Remus said.
"Hey Moony, where have you been? You took the map."
He hadn't meant to take it, but in retrospect was glad. "I was studying Runes in the
library."
"Oh, Runes! The excitement, be still my beating heart."
"I like Runes, all right?"
"You look terrible, Moony, why are you hanging about talking to us? Go to bed."
Remus felt tired but terribly keyed up. He lay in the bed with the curtains shut, knowing
that he had to wank or he would explode. He tried to imagine what he always did when
he wanked before. Before it was always a girl, someone saying his name and being,
vaguely, warm.
He had never fantasized about a boy, and never about Snape, his hair freshly washed,
squatting down next to him with an arm around his shoulders. No good, no good, every
old fantasy was interrupted by his memory of Severus saying the words "You would be
willing to do…anything with me right now" in his low voice next to Remus' ear. He felt
lucky he came so quickly, before he could say Snape's name out loud. He wiped his hand
and belly with the towel that he kept under the mattress and went to sleep.
Remus didn't want to avoid Snape and he didn't want to seek him out. Either possibility
felt potentially incriminating. Of the two of them, clearly only he was still interested in
snogging. Snape had gotten over that as soon as the rune spell was lifted. Right? They
had sixth-year Potions together two days later. If he was just pleasant to Snape in the
same way he had been, he could convey that he still wanted to be friends.
After class, he stopped for a moment to wait for Snape. He wanted to ask if they could
meet to study later in the week. He wouldn't ask about Potions, because he always asked
Lily for help with that. Even though Remus felt himself to be a bit of an odd duck and
Lily was the most popular girl in their year, they had a nice casual relationship and she
was happy to help him. She was the one who helped him find the charm to compensate
for his red-green spectrum color-blindness. Hogwarts teachers were utterly stupid about
things like that. It was up to the students to discover their own learning disabilities and
find magical ways to compensate for them. If he were a teacher here, he'd…
"Oh, hullo, Severus" he said, hoping that the poor light in the dungeon corridor outside
the Potions classroom would at least disguise his blushing.
"Lupin." Snape sneered, sweeping past.
Ah, we're back to that again. Damn. Remus was able to avoid looking crestfallen
only because he'd already had so much practice with Snape's snubs.
James, at his elbow, said, "You're getting awfully chummy with old Snivvy lately."
This sounded so much like Snape's imitation of the Pureblood accent that Remus had a
hard job not to laugh.
"Oh yes, bosom friends certainly, why we very nearly say hello to one another in the
hallway." Remus said, rolling his eyes. "Are we going to lose house points to Slytherin if
we get all the way to 'How are you'?"
"I don't like him," Sirius growled.
"Really, I'm sure he never would have guessed that. You'd better let it out, no good
keeping these things bottled up."
"I can't believe you said that, Remus." James said.
"Listen, I think the whole House Cup competition is utter rubbish and we should be over
all that feuding nonsense by this age." Remus said.
"But what about that time when Snape…" Remus cut Sirius off.
"You two used magic to expose the poor fellow in front of half the school last spring. Do
you think at this point you can call it even and stop? Isn't there going to be a point at
which we can all say hello to our classmates, without all this house rivalry rot?"
"You just don't understand about Snape, " James said. "He's interested in a lot of Dark
Arts stuff."
"Oh, and you yourself are a paragon of virtue. Where did you get that spell that hangs
people upside down by their ankles, some kind of handbook on using magic for all that is
fair and good? If this is how you get when I merely say hello to Snape, who happens to
be my Potions lab partner, what are you going to do if I actually become friends with
someone in another house?"
Finally James laughed. "You're right Moony, it is a little bit of an overreaction to you just
saying hello. It's not as though you're snogging him or something."
"What happens if I do snog someone from another house?" Remus said cautiously, to
cover his confusion.
"Ooh, has Remus been snogging someone from another house?" Peter overtook them
suddenly to ask.
"Is she a goer? Know what I mean? Nudge nudge, wink wink, say no more!" James said
in his silliest Monty Python voice.
Remus worried his eyes might pop right out if he rolled them again. "Let's go to lunch,
Graham Chapman and John Cleese, please!"
As they moved up the stairway, Remus felt the note in his pocket. Who charmed it there?
Hanging back in the shadow of a tapestry, he opened the parchment.
Lupin,
Meet me behind the greenhouses at 2PM. Your Charms class is cancelled today; Flitwick
has a bad cold.
SS
Behind the greenhouse! Even Remus knew that people snogged behind the greenhouse.
He felt divided between excitement and dread. What if Snape was setting him up,
planning to ridicule him or worse? He still didn't totally trust him. Or maybe he just
wants to talk somewhere people wouldn't overhear us.
After a very light lunch—Remus found he couldn't eat much—Remus went back to
Gryffindor to brush his teeth and comb his hair. If he does want to snog I'm not going
to smell of haggis, and if he doesn't, then, well, good dental hygiene.
Remus found the spot, a stone wall that shielded students from sight. Snape was waiting
and smoking. "Would you care for a cigarette, Lupin?"
"No thanks, I don't smoke." Snape put his out.
"Well then…would you care for a kiss?"
"Oh."
Remus wondered how Snape picked up all these moves. Snape leaned down and kissed
him, lightly and carefully, on the mouth. Remus slid his arms around the other boy,
eagerly, and began to kiss him in earnest. After a moment he slid from Snape's mouth to
his long throat, kissing the side of his neck. Snape pressed against him, exhaling with a
small, nearly unvocalized sound that made Remus' cock jump in his pants.
Snape leaned back against the stone wall and brought his bent leg between Remus' legs.
Then he began his impossibly delicate and careful assault on Remus' ear. As Snape's
tongue finally entered his ear wetly, Remus found himself grinding into Snape's thigh,
hanging on to his shoulders for dear life.
"Wait! Wait!" he gasped. "Wait! Oh!" He had to ask his question before he came all over
himself.
"What is it, Lupin?" Snape asked in a low, dangerous voice next to his ear.
"Does this mean…I mean…what made you change your mind? Do you…does this mean
you like me?"
He knew he sounded pathetic, but he looked into Snape's eyes anyway, trying to see what
had changed there.
"You don't think people can snog and mess about without liking each other, Lupin? How
do you think I've gotten all my sexual experience anyway? You would be amazed how
many people in this school will try to get off with someone they don't like or even fancy.
Especially girls, they are so curious, and it makes them feel happy to kiss someone ugly
so they feel beautiful. "
"Oh." Remus knew his face looked hurt and worried again, but what difference did it
make? "I wouldn't, though. I don't think you're ugly, not now that I can…not now that I
really see you."
"I heard…I heard what you said to Potter and Black about me."
"You did?"
"You stood up to them, for me."
"Not as much as I might have, though, Severus, I could have said…"
At this point Snape looked straight at him, fierce and wild and somehow hopeful. "I don't
know what you are hiding, I know there is a secret, but I don't think you are lying to me. I
think you really do like me."
"Severus…" Remus said, and touched his face gently, and kissed him, and then looked at
him again. "Yes, I like you, I don't think I've ever liked anyone so much."
"How can you…why do you keep looking at me like that?"
"I just feel like I've never seen you before."
Snape kissed him and kissed him, until they were both dizzy. He put his hands inside
Remus' school robes and pulled Remus' shirt out of his trousers and ran his hands up his
back. Remus' skin was warm and Snape's hands were cold, but they soon warmed against
his skin. Remus rubbed his body against Snape's, kissing every bit of bare skin he could
reach—his lower lip, his chin, his neck, his collarbones inside his shirt. Snape began to
lick his ear again, and they ground together, and then Snape opened Remus' trousers and
put his hand on Remus' cock and Remus came all over his hand, crying out in pleasure.
Snape wiped them off with a handkerchief and then started to tuck Remus in. Remus
reached for Snape's belt buckle, but Snape batted his hand away.
"Severus, please, please. I want to touch you. I want to touch you, too."
Snape averted his eyes and Remus undid his flies and took his hard cock in his hand. He
had never touched another boy's penis. He thought: I'll need some spit, I have nothing
slippery here. He started to spit on his hand and then thought, Ugh, I hate the way
spit dries up. I could just put it right into my mouth, that's slippery enough. So he
knelt down and took Snape's cock in his mouth.
He was just doing it matter-of-factly and suddenly he realized "I have his cock in my
mouth!" and then he was hard all over again. Snape was groaning and gasping
and saying "Oh, Remus, you don't have to…oh!" Remus opened his eyes and saw the
incredible, the amazing thing he was doing, the base of Snape's cock that was sliding
between his lips, the line of black hair from the other boy's navel to his groin. He
realized that he himself was moaning. Snape's hands were on his head, lightly grabbing at
his hair. Then Snape came, his cock moving in Remus' mouth and Remus ran his tongue
over the head to feel the jets of spunk coming out of someone else's cock and he licked
and licked and groaned and swallowed.
When he finally released him, Snape sank down to the ground next to him, leaning on the
wall. "I can't believe you did that," he said.
"I know. I got a bit carried away."
"It was…gods." Snape put his arm around Lupin and then kissed him again.
"I must be queer because I really liked doing that." Remus said quietly. "Though I don't
know, I think I still like girls. Is there such a thing as liking both?"
"I don't know, but I don't want you to find out." Snape smiled and kissed him. "I only
want you to like me."
This was the closest Snape had come to admitting that he liked Remus. It was something.
The smile was something, too. Remus wanted to look into those eyes for hours, but
eventually, they got cold on the ground by the stone wall, and had to go indoors.
Six months have passed. If he could ever be honest with himself, he would know why he
still allowed Severus Snape to grope him, to mess about with him in the dark corners of
the castle.
Even after Severus told him, "Your secret was that you were not a human being! You
can't love me because you aren't even a person!" while he wept his lycanthropic tears.
Even after that, even after he could no longer speak to Snape, even after "hello" was a
word too hard to say. They didn't say anything, anymore, but still their bodies spoke,
some queer language.
If only Remus Lupin could be honest with himself, could tell himself that he hoped to see
that face again, that loving face, that wild face, the true face of a person who felt, who
could not admit to feeling, passionately hopeful about him.
There are many reasons that it is impossible to be completely honest, when you are a
werewolf.