Sinope's Fiction: Secret Places

Title: Secret Places
Author: Sinope at (no spam!) gmail dot com
Rating: R
Pairing: Snape/Lupin
Summary: Severus likes to watch Lupin smoking. MWPP-era.
Author's notes: Just a fluffy fic inspired by Lupin_Snape chat. Much love to Nancy, who was kind enough to beta!
Disclaimer: This is an unofficial fan work. No profit was made; no ownership is implied.

Hogwarts' dungeons were cold in the seventies, much more so than in later generations, when parents finally decided that a lack of heating charms did not build a schoolboy's character. Severus could feel the wet sheen of the stones whenever he shifted position, and after a half hour of lying on his stomach, stretching quietly whenever his muscles began to cramp, the damp always chilled him to the bone.

The shivering was worth it.

Severus had found the nook in his first year, a forgotten crawl space that hovered below the dungeon stairs and above a broom closet. He liked it because he could feel the immensity of Hogwarts pressing in on him from all directions, its weight a physical force that pressed him to the ground where he could lie prone, breathing in draughts of cool, stale air. He also liked it because it opened onto the shadowed ceiling of the dungeon room where Remus Lupin went to be alone.

He'd never noticed the boy until then, really. Severus's schoolmates were divided into three categories: the Slytherins who stood up for him in public out of solidarity but snickered at him behind his back; the students who teased him to his face and inevitably outnumbered the hexes he could cast at one time; and the rest, students too stupid or too studious to pay attention to him. Remus had been a bland face that sometimes floated in the background as Potter and Black cast their curses, never quite participating but always covertly watching. An irritation, but then most things irritated Severus, especially the other students.

After the initial fear of discovery had been allayed, though, Severus discovered that he found it remarkably calming to watch the other boy when he sneaked down into the dungeons, usually at the late hours when Potter and Black, Severus imagined, were busy pulling their latest pranks. Sometimes Lupin simply walked into the corner, sat hunched against the wall with his arms pulling his legs tight against his chest, and stared at the opposite wall. Sometimes he brought in books and an extra lamp, writing essays while he bit his lip unconsciously. (Once, when he left some parchment behind, Severus went to look at his handwriting; it was very small and rounded, almost girlishly neat in appearance.) Those were things that Lupin could do in the library, though, and on most nights that he climbed down to the dungeon annex, he came to smoke.

As for himself, Severus had never seen the appeal of cigarettes. He'd tried them, of course, out of scientific curiosity, but the smoke choked his throat and reeked on his robes until he sent them to be washed. (Lupin, he'd discovered the first day, knew a rather useful spell for that problem.) He supposed he was lucky that the room was large enough for the smoke of one cigarette to dissipate before it reached his crawlspace; it meant that he could simply watch, and watch he did.

Lupin had a ritual for each cigarette (he only smoked one each day at most, perhaps rationing his pleasures). First he'd find his favorite corner, apparently chosen because of its proximity to the most warm torches. He'd sit down, cross-legged, and pull out his little tattered tobacco kit to rest on his lap. Opening the kit, he'd pull out one paper, then hold it up to the light to see which end had adhesive on it. Then, with thin, lissom fingers, he'd balance the paper on his right leg and sprinkle an even line of tobacco down the central crease, measuring it with a precision that Severus had only seen in Potions. Once Lupin was satisfied with the amount, he'd roll the paper into a cylinder with a flicker of white fingers, then bring the cigarette to his mouth to lick the adhesive in a smooth streak. Pressing the paper down to seal the cylinder, he'd pause for a moment, looking at the finished cigarette. Severus always wondered what he was thinking for that brief stare of wide-lashed eyes. Then the ritual was over; Lupin would whisper a wandless spell to kindle the cigarette's tip in a puff of flame, then bring the other end to his mouth and breathe in deeply.

Severus wasn't sure why he found the ritual so fascinating, let alone the minutes afterward as Lupin breathed in and out, whitish smoke tracing whorls around his face and eventually enveloping him in an aura of gray. The sight simply calmed him; each practiced movement followed another in a familiar chain, and he could drink in the presence of another solitary person without fear of being seen. By his fourth year, when Severus retreated to his secret space, he still didn't let himself consciously hope that Lupin would come, but he felt the faintest shadow of a smile on his face whenever Lupin did.

By his fifth year, Severus had begun to hate himself from the effort of making himself not hope.

He told himself that Lupin's fingers only unsettled him because they reminded him so much of girl's fingers, slender and uncalloused, better suited for stroking fabric and turning pages than for rough-and-tumble fights. They made him think of secrets and forbidden beckons, and, when Remus slid one fingernail down the cigarette paper, the stroking looked more sensuous than any witch's dragonsblood-red pouting lips. Maybe he's queer, Severus told himself. Maybe that's why he's trying to look as pretty as a girl.

Not that Lupin's tricks worked, of course; not that he was attracted to the boy's ashy hair falling over his eyes, or his flushed-pink cheeks, beyond unwilling frissions in his stomach that Severus called disgust. The day he had to stop calling it disgust, though, was the day that he watched Lupin's fingertips curl around a freshly-rolled cigarette, and he felt an undeniable hard-on pressing between his stomach and the stone floor.

Hard-ons, Severus had scientifically proven, did not generally disappear by being ignored. Ignore it he did, nonetheless, until Lupin had finished his cigarette and headed back to the Gryffindor dormitories; and then it was a matter of minutes to hurry back to his own bed, close the curtains, and wank as quickly and silently as he could imagine. (He tried to think about the centerfold witch from the Playwizard that had made the rounds that month, but he couldn't help imagining the touch of her fingers, light and delicate as they touched him, so similar to Lupin's.)

The next day was even worse. Lupin rolled his cigarette again - he'd been coming down to smoke more often this year, Severus had noticed - and all Severus could think about was wanking the night before, imagining those nimble fingers working beneath his robes, sliding under his pants, touching the secret places that Severus knew would make him come quickly and helplessly. By the time that Lupin had slid the paper across his pink tongue, Severus was shifting his stomach against the stone in short, helpless jerks, enjoying the painful friction while he valiantly kept his hands away, propping up his chin for the view. Severus was not one to give in easily to his body's demands, and he ruthlessly kept that position until Lupin left for the night; this time he couldn't wait longer, though, and he rolled over and thrust his hand under his robes and came in his pants within a few quick, urgent strokes.

That night, Severus stared upward as he lay in bed, thinking and not-thinking about what had happened. It wasn't fair, having his secret place taken over by a queer Gryffindor. But Severus was a Slytherin, damn it all, and he would take what he pleased, and if Lupin wanted to be such a girl that he made boys think dirty thoughts, then Severus wasn't responsible for the consequences. He would go back, and he would enjoy his secret as much as he liked. What was more, Severus rather liked secrets, and this was a good one to hold over Potter and Black - did they know their quiet little friend was a poof? Would they feel dirty for all the times they'd showered together, if they found out? The thought delighted Severus, and he imagined throwing it in their faces with razor-sharp wit, a scene which - replayed again and again in his mind's eye - distracted him into slumber.

If Severus had expected his plans of blackmail to make it any easier to watch Lupin exhaling a thin stream of smoke as he balanced a cigarette between two fingers, though, he had been mistaken. He could feel the shiver of arousal snake through him like white smoke, hardening his penis almost instantly - but this time, he was prepared. Severus gripped his wand and mentally issued a silencing spell, then rolled to one side, allowing himself access under his robes while he continued to watch Lupin suck on the cigarette between his lips. He threaded one hand under his pants, stroking himself with small, careful motions, imagining that his own bony fingers were as supple as Lupin's looked. Lupin shivered in the cold and drew his hair back behind his ear, and Severus thought of those hands in his own hair, sliding against his scalp and drawing him close for a kiss as sweet as any girl's. Right then, he thought, increasing the pace of his stroking, he'd feel Lupin's lips parting against his, and then he'd feel the touch of that moist pink tongue, sliding its way between Severus's own dry lips. Lupin would touch him sensuously and teasingly, prolonging the strokes until Severus couldn't help - but - come.

And come he did, convulsively shuddering as waves of pleasure rolled over him for longer than he'd ever felt. Severus felt wonderful, hardly even conscious of the cold or the damp any more, and he bit his lip to keep himself from calling thanks to Lupin when he left.

By the next day, he couldn't even ignore Lupin in the classes the two had together. He'd quietly noticed Lupin ever since the boy started visiting the dungeons, of course, but it was a passive awareness of his presence, not an active interest; Severus hardly cared to concern himself with what Potter and Black's friends did in the daytime. After what he'd seen and done, though, every hair on Severus's skin seemed to gravitate toward Lupin, quickening his breath and heartbeat whenever he looked over and saw the other boy nearby. The sensation became downright unbearable.

Severus couldn't wait until that night.

The same ritual started, just like the night before: Remus began smoking, and Severus began wanking. He could feel his breathing coming sharp and shallow as he neared his climax, closing his eyes to imagine the other boy's fingers dancing across his skin and exploring the secret lines and crevices of Severus's body. "Ohhh-" he hissed as he came, eyes still squeezed shut, and felt the by-now-familiar stickiness of come fill his pants. By the time he opened his eyes, Lupin had already left.

The next night, Lupin didn't come to the dungeon room. This in itself wasn't unusual; even when he spent the most time retreating to the dungeons, Lupin had always had the occasional night or two when he didn't show, presumably engaged in an early bed or homework assignment. What was unusual, though, was the way that Lupin acted during the day. Severus had caught him looking his way a few times in the past, a odd and irritating mixture of pity and curiosity in his eyes. This time the looks were different, though; whenever Severus looked at Lupin, the other boy was intently buried in his work, but Severus had the unsettling feeling that he'd only just looked away. Even more unsettling, when Severus thought through the previous night, was the fact that he couldn't remember the actual moment of casting a silencing spell; and Severus was not prone to forget easily.

Three more nights passed without Lupin's presence. Severus reacquainted himself with the solitude; the complete quiet certainly wasn't an unpleasant sensation, and it gave him plenty of time to meditate on his upcoming Transfiguration assignment. What was more, it gave him plenty of practice in mental discipline, as his unruly thoughts kept trying to linger on the empty dungeon cell instead of the platonic characteristics of liquids. The emptiness was a good thing, Severus decided.

That didn't stop him from feeling a current of pleasure when Lupin finally came back. He looked remarkably pensive, focused on some internal thought; still, he seated himself in the usual corner and began to open the tobacco pouch, pinching the paper between his fingers to hold it up to the light. As he drew the cylinder to his lips to lick, though, Lupin suddenly flung it to the ground and stood up abruptly. "I can't do this," he said, and a cold thrill shot through Snape as he realized that Lupin wasn't talking to himself. "I know you're there, Snape. I went back and found a strand of your hair, and it wasn't hard to find the spell to analyze it. So please - just - tell me what you're doing?"

He could run, Severus knew. He could slide out the way he'd come in, and he could disappear in the dungeons long before Lupin could find him. That would be the smart thing to do; Lupin, from what Severus knew of him, wouldn't dare throw something like this in his face publicly.

Thus it was a surprise to Severus as much as to Lupin when he slid out of the crawlspace, casting a quick spell to soften his fall to the floor of Lupin's room. "So," he said slowly.

"So?" Lupin prompted. Closer and looking at him directly, Severus could see the startling blue of his irises, even by torchlight. Severus could also see that Lupin was trembling slightly, whether from nerves or cold.

"I - apologize for my intrusion," Severus said, then stopped.

Lupin lifted an eyebrow. "So you're not sorry for watching me for Merlin knows how long - you're just sorry for forgetting your silencing spell and getting caught?"

Severus opened his mouth to reply sharply, then saw the glint of amusement in Lupin's eyes and conceded defeat. "More or less."

"Well, I just wanted to make that clear." Then the smile faded from Lupin's face again. "You know that whatever happens down here can't make its way to anyone else, right?"

"I'm not a fool, Lupin. As much as my error the other day may have indicated."

"All right, then." Lupin looked at him and slid one hand into Severus's. His fingers really are that soft, Severus had time to think, before Lupin leaned forward and kissed him. Lupin's lips felt soft and tentative against his, like puffskein skins and rose petals and all the potions ingredients that Severus wasn't supposed to enjoy touching. Severus wasn't sure if he was supposed to enjoy touching Lupin, but he did, and he could feel their cheeks brushing against each other like the fluttering of owl-feather down. Lupin drew back after a moment, still holding Severus's hand. "This is what you wanted, right?"

Severus raised an eyebrow, but somehow his rebellious lips wouldn't let him form the word "no."

finis.