#earlybloomingparentheses

He is afraid, he thinks. It is one-twenty-five in the morning and he can’t pretend he’s not anymore. He sets the quill down next to the empty length of parchment, shame at his failure coursing through him. He has been trying to write for three hours, and he has written nothing. Not even

Dear Sirius,

Because. Because is “dear” too much? Too presumptuous, too forward? Or, alternately: too formal? Too teacherly? Is Remus too old now? How had he started his letters to Sirius when he was a teenager and they were separated for the summer? It wasn’t dear, surely—though he rather thought that when they’d been older, and Remus had been newly in love and dreadfully sentimental as a result, it had been something like it. And there’s another question: Sirius. Is that wrong? Should he write to Padfoot instead? Almost certainly, he thinks, for the twentieth time that night, nearly taking up the quill again—but no, no, what if he has no right to call him that anymore? Or what if it hurts too much, stings Sirius like it does Remus, with the echoes of all they’ve lost, with the other names that used to accompany it?

Dear[est] [Moony, Wormtail,] Padfoot, [and Prongs],

Remus huffs out a noise of frustration and looks around his shabby hotel room. Less than a week since he left Hogwarts, left the only job he’s ever loved. Less than a week since he saw Sirius again. Since his world turned upside-down, or rightside-up, depending on how you look at it.

What’s right? What’s the right thing to say? I’m sorry. I’m not sorry. I don’t know what I’m supposed to be sorry for, or what you are. Maybe neither of us is meant to be sorry. Maybe that’s what we’ve learned, that it wasn’t our fault, it wasn’t our fault. 

The thought is dizzying, breath-stopping. For a second Remus glimpses freedom.

But no. Sirius may not see it that way. Twelve years in Azkaban. One on the run, eating rats. If only Remus had—what? What could he have possibly done?

Remus presses his palms into his shut eyes. He could have believed better. In Sirius’ innocence, or in his guilt. He could have chosen something, at least, to keep faith with.

Dear Sirius,

No. They’re the wrong words, Remus is sure of it. It might be wrong to write to Sirius at all. Sirius might not want him to. Sirius might hate him. Yes, they had embraced with apparent fervor that wonderful and terrible night in the Shrieking Shack, but that might have been temporary madness; Sirius might blame him. Or he might just—not—he might not care, anymore—if Azkaban did its work, or if time did. Or, or, he might care too much, hurt too much: there, again, Remus considers the possibility that he himself is too haunted by ghosts to be desirable by the living, that Sirius doesn’t want a missive from beyond the grave.

He is afraid. Of the writing. Of the reaching out. He is afraid of getting it wrong.

He has always been afraid of getting it wrong. There’s something broken in him, he thinks; however brave he wants to be, he’s never been brave enough.

But he thinks something, suddenly, something that has the quill back in his hand before he realizes he’s picked it up. Sirius knows this about him. Sirius has always known that Remus is afraid. Sirius used to pull him along, anyway, used to help him break the rules, help him get in trouble. If the Sirius now is still the Sirius that Remus used to know—and however afraid he is, he can’t truly pretend he didn’t glimpse his old friend behind the matted hair and wild eyes—Sirius will remember this about Remus. 

At least, Remus thinks, at least Sirius knows him.

Dear Sirius,

he writes, at long last,

#mayfestrecs - Day 7 Fest: RS Fireside Tales

Author: earlybloomingparentheses Rating: Mature Word Count: 7,430 Type: Canon Divergent!AU

Summary: I let the icy wind batter my face as I put my back towards the flickering lights of the bars and brothels and faced the roiling River Seine. As slippery with drink and clouded with the dregs of last week’s ill-advised Pink Elephant Potion as my mind was, I knew that I had not imagined him this time. Sirius Black had sat down at a table across the dimly-lit bistro and, lighting up a cigarette, had stared me directly in the eyes through the smoky haze. He’d flicked a glowing ember onto the red-and-white-checked tablecloth and leaned back in his chair, watching.

I rarely doubt my friend Sherlock Holmes anymore. I spent the early years of our acquaintance repeatedly made foolish, constantly surprised by his genius, by how often his absurd prognoses and obscure methods turned up the truth. I remember scoffing at his treatise on the “Science of Deduction and Analysis,” telling him such an approach to observation was “ineffable twaddle.” How wrong I was! How wrong I have been, again and again!

These days, I tend to accept his hypotheses, plans, and analyses without protest, however far-fetched or ill-advised they might be. I believed him dead once, and he turned up alive; it is hard to argue with such a miracle of a man.

But I have doubts now.

He says he is going to settle down in the Sussex countryside and keep bees. I cannot understand why he would believe this a recipe for his happiness.

Holmes once shared his view that “the lowest and vilest alleys in London do not present a more dreadful record of sin than does the smiling and beautiful countryside.” He claimed that the isolation of the country house meant all sorts of horrific deeds could pass unnoticed within its walls. It was this statement I recalled when he first spoke of relocating to Sussex. There was a logic to it: the first half of the great detective’s career had been spent rooting out crimes in the city; in the second, he would ferret out the more dangerous yet less noticed dens of iniquity amidst the fields and rivers.

But I soon learned that this is not at all what he intends. He intends to give up crime-solving altogether.

He intends to buy a little cottage, with ivy climbing up its walls, and daisies in the garden, and the salt smell of the sea in the air. He intends to keep company with the bees. He intends to sell his honey at the local market.

I have seen him grow languid and melancholy after a scant two days with no puzzle to pursue. I have seen him lie prostrate on the sofa for hours upon hours, lamenting the lack of interesting criminal activity in our vast and ever-changing city. I have seen him turn to the pipe, and the syringe, and the seven-percent solution to combat the grey fog of boredom that comes upon him when he is deprived of mental stimulation.

And I have seen him spring up again, all life and energy and keen brilliance, when some client arrives with a mystery to solve.

What will he do when the long tramps over the Downs offer no more fresh stimuli? When the bees’ complex dance grows rote? When the fog descends, and he is all alone with no prospect of some chance encounter bringing him back to life?

I remember what it was like to question him, in our early days together. His amusement at my skepticism I suffered with relative good nature; his condescension at my failures, though, sometimes stung. I do not wish to repeat the experience of having my doubts dismissed. Nor do I wish him to think I no longer trust his judgment.

But I worry too much for his well-being to remain silent.

So I voice my doubts one late afternoon, as he sits in his favorite old armchair, absorbed in a thick tome entitled The Bee-keeper’s Manual. I interrupt him, apologetically, and hesitantly lay out my concerns. He listens, face unreadable, as I ask, “What will you do when you find yourself alone, entirely at the mercy of your own thoughts?”

He nods slowly, looking thoughtfully at my worried face.

Remus wants to give Sirius all of himself again. He just doesn’t know if he can.

When they were young, it had been easy. No. Not easy—nothing about that time had been easy—but his feelings for Sirius had come fast and hard, almost vicious in their intensity. Their inevitability. The way he had wanted him, so much it ached, wanted him while believing, almost to the point of knowledge, that Sirius did not want him back.

Then he had discovered that Sirius did want him back. They had stood out by the Great Lake one evening, skating right up to the edge of curfew as the sky darkened over the forest, Sirius’ hand hidden in Remus’ pocket, their fingers clamped together and Remus’ pulse galloping. It wasn’t that he’d thought the two of them a particularly good idea back then—not safe, not safe at all—but he had been unable to stop up his heart. The love had just flowed right out. And he had believed (to the point of knowledge) that to love this deeply was worth whatever pain it caused. To be alive was to risk pain. To be close to someone was to risk pain. He wanted to be alive.

And he had been as close to Sirius as he could have wanted. Hands on his skin, in his hair, lips on his lips, knee brushing against knee under the table in the Great Hall feeling like a current of magic between them. In their flat after graduation, Remus used to kneel on the carpet and take Sirius in his mouth and watch. He would look up at him through damp lashes, barely breathing half the time, and Sirius would watch him back and even though Remus always thought that people who said eyes were the window to the soul had never really looked at their glassy inscrutable depths, he’d felt his lover’s gaze as a searing vulnerability. He would watch Sirius as he came. As Sirius struggled to keep his eyes open and fixed on Remus’ while Remus choked and swallowed, hating the taste and loving him.

But now. After. It’s harder now. Remus tries to look at Sirius like that again, long and open and without barrier, but neither of them can quite do it. One of them always ends up looking away.

The problem is not that Remus believes he’d been naïve when his younger self had decided that love was worth the risk of tremendous pain. He still believes that now. It’s not a question, really, of what he believes. It’s a question of what he’s capable of doing. After.

He had spent thirteen years forcing himself to swallow down the truth of what Sirius had done. Forcing himself to believe that James and Lily and Peter were dead because of the man he had loved. Forcing himself to ask, again and again, when Sirius had stopped loving him. If Sirius had stopped loving him. Remus did not doubt that Sirius’ love had been real. But something had changed, that final year, Sirius’ loyalties or his courage; something had changed that Remus could never have been big enough to combat. Remus had spent thirteen years forcing himself to look this truth in the eyes.

The fact that it had not been true had brought so much back to Remus. Life. Hope. Sirius.

And he loves Sirius now, and Sirius loves him. After all, neither of them had ever really stopped. But Remus’ heart is so scarred over. And underneath those scars? Young, red, tender flesh, still alive and beating hard as ever. Vulnerable and so, so easily crushed. He’d like to dig through the scar tissue to get to it, but he isn’t sure how. Isn’t sure if he can.

He’d like to really look Sirius in the eyes again, on his knees or not. He tries to hold his gaze a little longer every time they’re in bed together, every time they look at each other across the table at Grimmauld Place. Tries not to glance away. He always fails, but maybe someday he won’t. Maybe someday they’ll look at each other long enough that everything else will dissolve.

happy new year, everyone! I hope to write more fic this year so I'm starting today. -ebp

Remus Lupin's New Year's Resolutions, 1/1/1979

1. Get out of the flat more often. Go for a walk at least once/day.

2. Less takeaway. Soup is easy; make soup.

3. Buy the good chocolate sometimes. You can afford it if it’s just once in awhile.

4. Tell friends more things more often. Ask for more of what you need. They won’t hate you for it. You should know this by now.

Tell James it bothers you when he suggests solutions to your problems that require tremendous amounts of inherited wealth (e.g. buy house instead of renting shitty flat).

Tell Peter to stick up for himself esp. re: not liking spicy food???

Tell Sirius that

5. Stop feeling bad about your feelings.

6. THOUGHTS DO NOT MAKE YOU BAD.

Even those ones.

7. Let yourself at least express your thoughts to yourself.

Admit that you

Fuck

8. Ask for small raise at work + call in sick if needed after full moons.

9. Maybe you could write him a letter. Not to send (actually you should send it but let’s say you won’t so you actually write it). Just say that you’re sorry but you have feelings for him and you know that this is probably awkward but you’ll get over it like he got over James fifth year and it’ll be fine and normal once you’ve admitted it to him!

Tell him not to get a big head about it. Yeah, yeah, everyone wants him, sure, but they don’t know he’s a complete MESS they just know he has good HAIR and a kissable MOUTH

So what does it say about me that I do know he’s a mess and I still want him?

10. Maybe less self-analysis this year. Maybe more risk taking.

Addendum from SB 1/31/79: Remus, you’re adorable. Sorry to read your super secret New Year’s resolutions but I got bored while you were in the shower and poked around your desk and they were just lying out under a big stack of notebooks and library books and blank rolls of parchment so I couldn’t help seeing them. Glad you followed resolution number 10 or you’d have suffered the tragedy of missing out on my KISSABLE MOUTH and GOOD HAIR. Also, I’m going to buy you a whole box of the good chocolate and you can’t stop me!!

A companion to this ficlet about Remus Lupin’s 1979 New Year’s resolutions.

Sirius Black’s IN & OUT list for 1979

IN

tattoos

leather jackets

totally safe flying motorbikes

The Bastard Banshees (at top volume)

being erased from your family tree

fighting fascists 

chips with curry

lycanthropy

OUT

blood supremacy

peppermint schnapps

boring haircuts

being a prick just because you can

being jealous of your best mate’s girlfriend

pretending you’re heterosexual

chips with brown sauce

silently wondering if someone you kind of have a thing for might also have a thing for you or at least not be totally averse to the idea of you sitting on his face sometime

Sherlock Holmes has many peculiar habits. The public, of course, is well aware of this, and finds him all the more fascinating for them; but there is one which must remain forever a secret. In some respects, this is a pity, for it would add substantially to the portrait I have created of the great detective over my years of documenting his cases. I daresay many would find it of great interest. However, I have no wish for either of us to be sentenced to two years’ hard labor.

I first observed this habit some a year or so into our acquaintance, during the early period of our cohabitation. I was in no way prepared for it, despite knowing of the violin, the alternating periods of mania and languor, and the seven-percent solution. Not to mention the sodomy. Ah—no, the infamous vice is not the peculiar habit to which I refer. Well, not precisely.

He and I, it transpired, were both inclined towards the male sex, though Holmes more exclusively than I. He had sniffed me out almost immediately, and had, I must say quite generously, revealed his own proclivities to ease my fears of being turned over to the policemen who sometimes frequented our sitting room. We had even, after a time, shared the occasional moment of physical pleasure together. After all, the circumstances could hardly have been more convenient.

No, what shocked me first occurred one evening in June, as the sky was fading toward night and I sat at my desk in the sitting room, writing a sketch of what was to be my next installment of his adventures in the Strand. I was absorbed in my task, but gradually, I became aware of a noise behind me. Something soft, repetitive, and more or less rhythmic. I turned to look.

Sherlock Holmes had his trousers unbuttoned, and his long, slender prick was hard between his long, slender fingers. He stroked it firmly, without urgency, but with a lingering touch that suggested a good deal of pleasure. I looked, utterly startled, up at his face. His dark eyes were on me.

“Holmes,” I stammered. “What—I—good heavens!”

“Yes?” he replied, not ceasing the movement of his hand.

“Well—but—but what if someone comes in?” I blustered, attempting to cover my disorganized astonishment with some decently logical response.

“I shall put it away,” he said mildly.

I blinked.

“I like watching you write,” he said.

I stared.

“Please, don’t let me interrupt you.”

I swallowed, fumbled for words, found none. A peculiar flush was coming into my cheeks. His eyes were still fixed on me, a slight smile hovering around his mouth but never quite settling there. My own trousers were, perhaps, beginning to tighten.

“You are a strange man,” I said, unsure if that is really what I wanted to say. I looked for another moment at his stiff prick, glistening under his fingers, then turned back to my notes.

He does this now from time to time, when I am writing in our sitting room at 221B. I sneak glances, naturally, but I continue at my task. It is…distracting, but not unpleasant. I daresay the quality of my stories has not suffered, given their continued popularity with the reading public. And more often than not, he graciously allows me to fuck him once both of us have finished our work.

It’s a rough day here in the U.S. I spent election day paralyzed by deep dread; today, I have inauguration day off work (because, ironically, it is also MLK Day), and I anticipated it might be more of the same. I didn’t think I was going to be able to get anything done, and it's looking like I won't manage to get out of the house to the local they bar or craft night. One of the contradictions of writing “The Bent” is that I’ve never fully been immersed in the kind of in-person community centered on queerness that this fic depicts. It’s true that most of my irl friends are queer, and many of them create art, but I’ve always had a little too much social anxiety to really get in on that sort of queer scene, especially the parts involving late nights at the club (lol). But I always remind myself that fandom counts—queer fandom—it’s real queer community and real queer art. When you read comments on queer fics, you know how much they mean to people. So I decided to write some fic today: some really gay shit with lots of bodily fluids and queer&trans pleasure and anti-authoritarian politics, so that hopefully I, and anyone reading it, can feel some connection amidst this mess—connection to each other, to our bodies, to the parts of ourselves we refuse to stamp out. And it felt right to return to the world of “The Bent” today, given the political situation. This little Bent bonus, "Obscene Material," takes place in the immediate aftermath of a raid on the Flaming Bush, which sparks a need for care and closeness amongst the Marauders + Lily.

Sending love and solidarity to you wherever you are—goodness knows that many people are in precarious or difficult positions all over the world right now—and hoping you find some sense of belonging today. If you are a reader, a writer, a lurker, you belong here; you count. You have a home.