Fic: The Utter Wrongness of Two-Day Trips

Fic: The Utter Wrongness of Two-Day Trips
Author: sheafrotherdon
Pairing: Remus/Sirius
Rating: PG (for language)
Disclaimer: JKR owns the pups, I merely play with them
Summary: Remus leaves for two days. Sirius doesn't like it.
A/N: A piece of unadulterated silliness I wrote this morning -- an effort to get my elusive pups to play. Stealth thanks to setissma who'll recognize some of these themes ;)



It’s just two days. Two days, says Remus – barely enough time to miss anyone (as if there were a chart somewhere, with the how and why of missing inked onto the page). I’ll be back before you know it – but Sirius knows better and he pouts a little (never means to) and Remus nudges the sulk away with a fleeting whisper of lips and tongue. Padfoot. Sirius shrugs and hands him his bag and steps aside to smile at him (ruefully) and Remus is gone – vicious crack of Apparation, and the flat fills up with absence.

Sirius scratches at his nose and watches dust motes whirl.

The trouble is – he’s managed not to think of this through two mugs of tea and three chapters of Dickens – that there are holes now, Remus-shaped holes all over the flat, and no amount of cheerful thinking can fill those spaces. He closes Little Dorrit (masochism tends to strike when he’s lonely) and stares at the end of the couch, where the cushions sag with the memory of someone else’s weight. He rolls his eyes and goes to make a sandwich, but there are toast crumbs in the butter, and Sirius’ irritation flares because bloody fucking toast crumbs, but who’d hear him if he yelled?

“Maudlin’ bloody pisser,” he growls at the bread, and the cheese looks abashed. The empty mug in the sink says nothing.

He floos to James’ place and thanks a varied collection of wizarding saints that there’s no half-clothed snogging taking place on the sofa when he gets there. By current reckoning he’s interrupted that sort of scene 33½ times -- Lily once ran down the hallway so quickly he couldn’t see the color of that particular bra. He knows she has several variations on white, one red, two black, and a lacy thing that’s vaguely purple, and he’s starting to think his friends are tawdry exhibitionists.

Lily Evans seems the sort.

James has a hangover – Peter’s capacity for alcohol consumption is a thing of legend, but James never seems to learn that matching him pint for pint is a ridiculous idea. Sirius insults James’ manhood – and his intellect, which is roughly the same as that of an Erumpent on acid when he gets around Guinness – but brews up a potion just the same (flavoring it with cayenne pepper instead of mint leaves to make James’ eyes do that woogly thing that’s so fucking funny). By mid-afternoon they’ve exchanged four punches, seventy-two insults, and are flying over Ilkley Moor with unbridled glee. Cackling as he watches James demonstrate the Longbottom feint (which mostly involves dropping like a stone while asking ‘what the fuck am I doing wrong?’) Sirius almost forgets that the flat will be empty when he goes home.

Almost.

He lingers at James’ place, eating curry and eventually a banana, drinking the beer someone left three Saturdays ago. (That was a party, and Sirius is still trying to forget what he saw in the pantry, and he hopes everyone remembered their contraception charms). It’s after midnight when he floos home, and falls into bed, but even with the beer buzz the space beside him is horribly empty. He can’t get warm, even when he hugs a pillow and puts another blanket on the bed, so he tries to sleep in the middle of the mattress because fuck, he’s not supposed to be this much of a nance. It doesn’t work – it feels all wrong, and he curls on his side and dreams of toast crumbs and wakes to find it’s Sunday and there’s no one fighting him for the crossword puzzle.

Two-day trips are far too long.

Peter floos in and suggests they go eat breakfast at the greasy spoon around the corner, and Sirius suspects James has been owling people. (‘Sirius is a pathetic bastard. For the love of mugwort, go feed him eggs.’) But the greasy spoon doesn’t have Remus- holes (unlike the hallway, which is missing a coat, or the bathroom, which is missing a toothbrush) and the eggs are fantastic, especially covered in salt. Peter has all kinds of stories about Bulgaria (which are especially funny when heard over sausages), and he tells Sirius all about betting on horses, which is a hobby of sorts. He’s lost fifty Muggle pounds so far and Sirius loses four that afternoon, but learns what the word ‘punter’ means and considers it a fair exchange.

By early evening there’s nothing to do but go back to the flat and finish the work he was supposed to finish on Thursday – forms in triplicate, and a report about Gertrude Tomkins’ cat. There’s ice cream for dinner, and the last teabag in the house tastes bloody perfect, but the Remus-hole by the kitchen window makes him grouchy, not least of which because the dishes aren’t getting washed. He practices concealment charms until his wand-arm cramps, and accidentally hides Remus’ favorite edition of Nifflers and the Men who Love Them so well he can’t find it again, no matter how many reversal spells he tries. He mopes off to bed, to cold sheets and the certainty that he’s a sad bastard, and falls asleep because he’s miserable rather than because he’s tired.

Sirius doesn’t hear the crack signaling Remus’ return – only wakes when the mattress shifts and someone warm curls up against his back. He feels a hand creep under his t-shirt, lay soft against his skin, and he smiles as breath chases across back of his neck, making him shiver. “Moony,” he breathes and doesn't care how daft he sounds because everything’s right when there are knees pressed against his own. He shifts and turns and touches Remus’ nose with his finger, because it’s his nose that makes everything real, his absurdly long nose. Remus grins at him, and flutters his fingers in the small of Sirius’ back, and when they kiss it’s playful and Sirius wriggles as they pull apart. “Hi,” he whispers, with a nip to the corner of Remus’ mouth. “How was the trip?”

Remus shakes his head, and hooks his foot around Sirius’ ankle as he walks his fingers over Sirius’ bicep. “I missed you terribly,” he whispers, and Sirius can’t help but smile his understanding into a kiss.