Sinope's Fiction: Remus/Sirius Drabble

Title: Remus/Sirius Drabble
Author: Sinope at (no spam!) gmail dot com
Rating: R
Pairing: Remus/Sirius
Summary: between the horses of love and lust we are trampled underfoot
Author's notes: A drabble for musesfool on the above summary.
Disclaimer: This is an unofficial fan work. No profit was made; no ownership is implied.

There's a thrumming building in your breast, an anticipation of words-that-could-be-said that billows up until it chokes your throat, forestalling any opportunity to release this terrible secret. Padfoot's lying across the campfire from you, the dull red flickering over his sleep-touselled hair; one of his hands scratches unconsciously over his crotch. If you were James, you'd be snickering at the way he sprawls over the dead leaves that line the Forbidden Forest, his hand just far enough from the fire to avoid getting burnt. Instead, you're you, and you can't help but think how easy it would be to love Sirius if he weren't the most beautiful wizard in Hogwarts.

The fire reaches a sap vein, popping with a burst of yellow sparks. You've always been slightly ashamed of the fact that you find Sirius handsomest like this: asleep, graceless, stripped of all his vanity and charm. Like this, Sirius becomes reduced to a collection of aesthetically aligned points and angles, the planes of skin and the arcs of flesh. You could calculate Arithmancy from his body; you could stroke it until your fingerprints smoothed away. And it's awful enough when James and Peter are around, but tonight, while they ambush Lily in some reckless scheme, there's nothing but shallow flames between you and that restless body.

It would be enough, too, if you could love him. Men who love each other aren't ashamed to show affection. You could say, it's awfully cold tonight, and he'd say, then let's huddle for warmth, and you'd curl up together, your torso snug with his back; you'd dream of the voluptuous Hufflepuff Rosmerta. Smoke would linger in your nostrils the next morning, waking up to find the fire burnt out and the hoofprints of centaurs circling your camp; he'd stretch, muscles tensing and reshaping against your skin. Then you'd try to figure out how many centaurs there were from the footprints, and he'd laugh at you for trying, but guess the right answer before you anyway.

You bite your lip restlessly, running the dry flap of skin between your teeth. Time seems endless for a moment, a disconcerting and dizzy certainty that you've been watching him like this forever, a thirsting adolescent Tantalus. The moon has already set, and you hear untamed owls screeching in the trees. You can't touch him, not tonight. He'd disappear the moment you reached his skin.

finis.