Everything is gay.

James stood just outside the record shop, leaning beneath the awning, half-forgotten by the world as he watched his best friends spin into something more than just friendship.

The street musician on the corner—mad, clearly—hadn’t stopped playing. Something slow, something old-fashioned. A waltz, James thought, though Sirius wasn’t quite keeping to time, and Remus was certainly never on beat.

Sirius had one hand in Remus’ and one at his waist, dragging him across the puddled cobblestones with a grin too wide and too alive to belong to anyone else. His hair clung to his face, soaked and gleaming like ink, his robes heavy with rain, and yet he looked lighter than James had seen him in years.

Remus was laughing. Really laughing. The kind that made his eyes crease shut and his shoulders shake, the kind James had only seen when they were all half-delirious with mischief or up late enough to forget they were haunted boys.

“Come on, Moons, it’s one-two-three, not whatever that foot-mangling nonsense was.”

“I am doing one-two-three,” Remus insisted, swaying off rhythm and splashing water up Sirius’s leg. “You’re just terrible at leading.”

“I am the picture of grace,” Sirius declared, spinning them both into a full circle that nearly knocked over the streetlamp. Remus wheezed out another laugh, clutching at Sirius’ shoulder to keep from slipping.

James’ heart ached in the best possible way.

And then—without fanfare, without warning—Sirius stood up on his toes, fingers still tangled in Remus’, and kissed him.

The moment their lips met, lightning split the sky—brilliant and sudden—followed by a crack of thunder so loud it rattled James’ ribs.

He almost laughed. It was ridiculous, like the storm had been waiting for this, like the whole world was clapping for them.

And maybe it was.

Because in the middle of that rain-slicked street, with water soaking them and music still floating through the storm, Sirius kissed Remus like he was the only reason the sun ever rose. And Remus kissed him back like he’d finally remembered how to breathe.

James swallowed the lump in his throat.

God, he loved them.

And in that moment, with the rain and the thunder and the two people he cherished most wrapped in something as real and reckless as magic—