Chapter Text
Waking up in an elevated mood isn’t a common occurrence for Remus Lupin. In fact, on most days, especially on those groggy mornings after a full moon, he wakes up with no other desire than to plant his face deep inside his pillow.
So, when Remus finds himself awake and cheerful following the events of the day prior, he smiles to himself as he rests on the soft white sheets of his bed. Sirius had given him a rose—a rose that he’d made sure to preserve yesterday evening in a makeshift vase he’d designed from a glass he’d stolen from the kitchens. Though Remus knows the implications of keeping a rose given to him by the friend he’s in love with, he chooses to ignore them.
Why does Sirius have to be so bloody righteous?
It makes it harder for Remus to run the opposite way.
Despite it all, he runs his hand through his face, perhaps as an attempt to wipe off the stupid grin on his face. When he gets out of bed, there is a slight pain on the outer side of his knee, followed by a tightness around the area of his hip. Ultimately, he chalks it up to all the soreness from the danger he’d been running from these past two days. He arrives at the Great Hall earlier than he usually does, with only a fifth of all students already eating their breakfast.
As usual, once he sits down and makes his tea, he grabs five packets of sugar, rips them open, and pours all of them shamelessly into his drink. Upon his first sip, he looks up to find Lily setting her bag on the table across from him, raising her eyebrows at the many sugar packets scattered on his side of the long table. “You’re going to get diabetes one of these days.”
He gives her a big smile and proceeds to lift his cup up for another sip. “If I’m going to die then I’m doing it on my own terms.” Remus eyes the space in front of him and motions for her to take a seat.
She sits down and laughs. “Who are you and what have you done with my Remus? You’re never in a good mood whenever you’re a subject to waking up.”
“So I’m never in a good mood, period?” Remus’ smile hasn’t even left his face, and no matter how hard he tries, the edges of his mouth just won’t rest.
“What is it that’s got you in this. . . setup?” Lily narrows her eyes and leans in. She grabs his head with one hand and, with the other, feels his forehead. He yelps and fights off her hands, leaving them both in laughter. “Seriously!”
When his laughter subsides, he just shakes his head and says, “There’s nothing.” Lily glares at him. “Really.”
Defeated, Lily sighs and squints at him. “I’ll figure it out. Just you wait. You’ll soon learn the lesson that you are physically unable to keep secrets from me.”
“I’m waiting,” he drawls, an eyebrow raised.
“For what?” A new voice arises. Remus looks to Lily’s left, and Sirius just casually joins them and sits next to her. Both their eyes widen in surprise as he slips into the spot as if he’s used to it—which he isn’t.
Remus clears his throat and opens his mouth, meaning to answer his question, before Lily does so for him, “Remus has been a lot happier than usual and he’s waiting on my attempt at figuring out why.” She looks strangely at Sirius; and for a moment, Remus panics that she has it figured out.
Sirius, as expected, tilts his head to the side and squints at Remus. “Is that right, Moony?” When Remus turns a shade redder, the other boy smirks.
Merlin, help me.
“There’s nothing,” he insists, rolling his eyes. “And Sirius, might I remind you, you’re not even from this table. I think you just might be the very first Slytherin to ever even touch it.” This time, Remus tilts his head at the boy in front of him.
Shrugging, Sirius picks up a piece of toast and tosses it on his plate, before grabbing a knife and smothering it with all kinds of jellies. “Perhaps. I’ve stopped caring, weirdly, since we’ve gotten close.” He looks up from his bread and grins at Remus. “You’ve gotten me all mushy.”
What do I even say to that?
Lily raises a brow and clicks her tongue. “You two are so weird.”
“Wait,” Sirius says, body tensing as his eyes widen, completely ignoring Lily completely. He looks right at Remus in a way that shares the resemblance of horror and realization. “It’s not Asher, is it?”
Remus is taken aback at the very mention of Finley. “What?”
In an instant, Sirius’ expression seems to flicker like a faulty lightbulb. There is no mistake in assuming he’s getting upset about Finley again. When Remus doesn’t respond with anything else, Sirius shakes his head and chuckles without humor. “It is him. I fucking knew it.”
“What are you talking about?” Lily asks as she shakes her head.
“The reason why Remus has been happier. . .” Sirius drawls, his stare at the boy in front of him unmoving. He clasps his hands together and gasps in mock surprise. “. . . is Finley Asher.”
If there is an expression out there in the vastness of this universe that equals five thousand facepalms or more, Remus represents it at this moment.
“No!” declares Remus, almost in offense. He takes another sip of his tea. “Haven’t even spoken to him since. Actually, well—”
“Nope.” Sirius tuts. He refuses to look at Remus for some strange, odd reason. Instead, he turns to Lily, who looks completely disappointed in both of them. “I think I’ve figured it out all on my own, Evans.” He scrunches his nose, grabs his plate, and gets up from the Gryffindor table to leave.
When he’s out of range, Lily smacks her hand on the table, breaking Remus out of his staring at Sirius leaving without doing anything trance. “Go get your boyfriend back.”
Remus almost spits out his tea. “My what.”
Just the implication of Sirius being Remus’ boyfriend makes him lose every bit of himself for a brief moment. His fingers freeze and he can physically feel his heart beating in his chest, something he wasn’t aware of before. And most importantly, it replays a certain event in his mind—the bathroom incident.
“You definitely heard me,” she says.
He goes red. “He is not my boyfriend. We’re friends—”
“Oh, but you like him, though, don’t you?” Lily rests her head on her arms, prompted up on the table. Squinting at Remus’ face, she decides to continue, “You may not want to, but you do. It’s there in your eyes.”
He gives in. “Is it really that obvious?”
“Oh, just a little bit.” She smiles, every bit like the sun. For a moment, Remus wonders how more people haven’t fallen for Lily Evans with that smile. “You poor thing.”
Remus groans into his hands as Lily rubs his back. Even in absolutely frustrating times like these, she’s always been one of the greatest mediums of comfort he’d immediately run to. There is a great balance of realism and hope when speaking to Lily Evans.
“He’s jealous,” Lily notes, to which Remus shakes his head. “What? He is!”
Remus scoffs.
“There’s nothing about me to be jealous of,” he grumbles. He’s a werewolf, he’s not a very social person, he’s equally as academically gifted, and, here’s the kicker, he's a werewolf. What is it about Remus that makes Sirius jealous? Besides, Lily was one to talk about knowing when someone was being jealous.
And she just stares at him blankly.
“You can’t be this thick.” Eyes widening, she slaps her hand over her mouth and sighs into it. She then starts snapping her fingers in front of his face as a last resort. “You’re smarter than this, Remus!”
Remus just rolls his eyes. “I’m tired of talking about Sirius all the bloody time! It’s like everything about him has been going absolutely haywire ever since the fucking bathroom, and—”
Lily narrows her eyes at him and grabs his shoulders. “What about the bathroom?”
Shit.
“We. . . uhm. . . sort of. . .”
“Sort of?”
“While-he-was-drunk-we-made-out-in-the-bathroom,” Remus says as quickly as he can, refusing to dwell on the topic for an extended amount of time; and even then, Lily gasps in shock.
Lily smacks her hand down on the table, causing others next to them to flinch. She gives them an apologetic glance before turning back to Remus with a deadly glare. He swears he might’ve even seen her eyes twitch. “You what?”
“He started it!” He tries to justify himself.
“No, I’m not mad about that,” she says, rolling her eyes. “I’m mad about the fact that you two are still hovering around each other like—like—oh, I don’t know! Like idiots!”
Remus rolls his eyes and just ups and leaves. He’s tired of talking about Sirius. He’s tired of thinking about Sirius. For once in his life, he just wants to be without being so in his head about one boy. And while Lily rolls her eyes at his admittedly dramatic leaving, charging threatically towards the end of the Great Hall, she yells, “You have not seen the last of me, Remus Lupin!”
On his way out, he bumps into Peter, who calls after him, “Oi! What’s the matter with you?”
Sighing, he stops and turns to face his friend. He sucks in a breath and answers, “I’m just tired, s’all. Sorry—uhm. . . Lily’s in the Great Hall. . . I’ll be heading to the library, yeah?” He doesn’t make much sense, but he never has to, with Peter.
Peter, as a response, pats both his shoulders and gives him a tight smile. “You’re alright, mate.” Then, unexpectedly, as if Remus had just turned into a goblin, he widens his eyes and takes a step back. “Your hair is pink.”
“What.”
“Your. Hair. Is. Pink,” Peter makes sure to enunciate every consonant and vowel, instilling the fact that, somehow, Remus’ hair has turned pink.
Remus blinks. “The fuck do you mean my hair is pink?”
Peter reaches to run his hands through Remus’ hair, only for the latter to swiftly swat them away. “Do you think that I’d actually make up the fact your hair is fucking pink? Take a damn look for yourself—” He grabs Remus by the arm and proceeds to drag him to the nearest bathroom.
“‘Course it is,” says Remus exasperatedly, rolling his eyes. “Next you’ll tell me the bloody Queen of England shagged Dumbledore.”
It isn’t until they enter the boys’ bathroom and he sees his reflection in the mirror that he’s faced with the fact that Peter was most definitely not taking the piss. His entire head of hair is now bubblegum-fucking-pink.
WHAT THE FUCK?
He runs out of the bathroom, eyes wide, pushing past Peter as he laughs at Remus’ reaction. Perhaps out of instinct, he runs to the Great Hall to find Sirius, only to find that many more seated in the Great Hall are rocking pink hair, and very clearly confused about it—Sirius included.
Remus notices that Peter’s caught up behind him, still laughing quite hard at this predicament. “At least you aren’t the only one,” says Peter, nudging him. It’s a situation so unbelievable that he can’t even say anything to react.
He then catches Lily’s eyes and starts darting towards her because contrary to most of the population sitting in the Great Hall, her hair did not turn pink. “Lily.”
Lily raises her eyebrows at him, very clearly holding back a smile. “Remus.”
“My hair is pink.” His eye twitches a bit as he points a finger at the top of his head.
Her mask falters as a large smile creeps up her face. “I can see that.” She tips her head to her left, towards the Slytherin table. “So is Sirius’ hair.”
Lily’s ability to stay casual about this entire situation is completely above him, because, well, how does this just happen to half of the Great Hall out of nowhere? There are so many questions and thoughts going on inside Remus’ head that he just does not know where to begin.
“Why is—are you—ngh,” he whines, barely getting any words out as Lily laughs and he frustratedly marches over towards Sirius’ spot at the Slytherin table, who is also having a crisis about his hair turning a completely different color. Sirius’ eyes widen, as well as the eyes of his friends, at Remus’ similar predicament. The only people in their group without strange, pink hair are Regulus, Dorcas, and Barty, who seem to be finding the entire thing rather hilarious. Despite the fact pink hair was a completely different look for Sirius, Remus notes that it sort of, strangely, suits him—which Remus could be biased about. To him, Sirius could pull off anything. Though all of these thoughts run circles around Remus’ brain, he decides to ask him, “What the fuck did you do?”
“What did I do?” Sirius leans back, aghast. He points his finger at his own hair. “You think I’d voluntarily do this to myself?”
“Ahem!” Dumbledore’s voice booms from across the room, prompting Remus to quickly take a seat next to Sirius. He clicks his tongue and clinks his spoon against his cup for everybody’s undivided attention. When everyone is settled and silent, he begins, “As you all most definitely have noticed, we currently hold a slight predicament at our hands—” the Headmaster gives them all a slight smile, humoring them all, “And believe it or not, I already have a theory of my own as to how this happened.”
There is a loud silence that befalls them immediately; and a pin could drop in this room at this very moment and everybody would be able to hear it. Sirius shuffles next to him, brows furrowed. Their knees touch slightly, and while Remus holds his breath for a bit, Sirius remains considerably still.
“My theory,” Dumbledore continues, scanning the audience, “is that somebody here has tampered with our supply of a certain ingredient.” He pauses. “Who here ate eggs this morning?” About a third of the Great Hall raises their hands, some of which without pink hair. “That couldn’t be it, then. Who here used the syrup?” Again, it gave a mixed response. “Ah, what about the sugar?”
Finally, everyone who raises their hand are all those with bright pink hair, bringing a knowing smile to Dumbledore’s face. He swallows a laugh and starts again, “Well, unless anybody would like to confess now to having tampered our supply of sugar, then Minerva and I will begin to investigate ourselves.” Dumbledore is about to leave his lectern, before adding, “Mind you, it will take a significantly longer time for Madam Pomfrey to find a remedy for this. . . situation. . . if nobody is willing to speak up, or at least tell me in private:”
When he steps down, the room bursts into a fit of chatter and confusion. Strangely, the first thought Remus has in the midst of all this is—Sirius uses sugar? That had been different in the other reality.
“I can’t believe this is actually happening,” Barty says immediately, laughing so hard Remus could see the water in his eyes. “You’re all pink!”
Evan glowers at him, both his hands covering his head. “If you want to keep your tongue, Barty, you might want to keep that to a minimum.” He pauses, seemingly noticing Remus at their table for the first time. “Wait a second, how’d you get here—”
“Well, Dumbledore started talking—” Remus tries to explain, but that explanation remains futile, as Evan interrupts him.
“Doesn’t matter, actually. Welcome.” He leans in and smirks at Snape, who resides just a few people down the table from them, his hair also pink. “What does matter is that at least we know who it wasn’t.”
Snape proceeds to send him a deathly glare, to which Evan raises both his hands, feigning surrender.
Sirius giggles, and even Remus lets out a snort, to which Sirius just looks at him with this expression—as if he’d just now truly acknowledged and processed that Remus is here.
“It wasn’t you, was it, Remus?” Sirius jokes, smirking. When the other boy deadpans, he smiles and reaches to touch Remus’ hair. He goes silent for a second before admitting, “Pink doesn’t look too bad on you, actually.”
Remus waves him away. “Come off it.”
“I’m serious!”
This time, it’s Remus’ time to smile. “Yeah, I know.”
Sirius rolls his eyes at that.
“Are we going to figure out who did this?” Dorcas asks, searching for a group consensus. “I mean, as much delight as I’m having in seeing half my friend group like this, I must say, I can’t be seen around people with pink hair.”
Barty tips his head to the side, motioning it towards the Gryffindor’s table. “McKinnon’s got pink—”
Dorcas smacks him, despite her gaze being fixed at Marlene.
Pandora shrugs. “I’d like to find out who did it, actually. It’d be like those muggle mystery novels. What was it—Sherwill Holmes?”
“Sherlock,” Remus corrects her, giving her a small smile. “Sherlock Holmes.”
Again, rolling his eyes, Sirius says, “Of course you would know.”
Remus raises an eyebrow. “My mother is literally a muggle—”
“It doesn’t matter,” Regulus cuts in mid-bicker, hands covering both his ears and face scrunched up in a reflection of great annoyance. “Please, just let Dumbledore do his due diligence and not get in the way in an expectation of experiencing some Agatha Christie mystery.”
Remus narrows his eyes at Regulus. “You read Agatha Christie?”
Regulus ignores him. “It’d be best if we don’t poke our heads into something we are clearly not involved in. Now, if you’ll excuse me—” he gets up and raises his eyebrows, “—I’m going to continue on with my potion before class today.”
Sirius rolls his eyes at his brother and waves him off. “Always so dramatic, that one.”
When they do end up leaving the Great Hall half an hour later, Sirius unexpectedly pulls Remus off to the side, off into an empty corner behind a statue away from any other students. Even through Remus’ many complaints, Sirius stays quiet seemingly until he’s absolutely sure no one else is around. While Sirius checks on his surroundings, though, Remus finds a liberty in just looking at Sirius. It is definitely odd seeing him with his hair pink, but that just gives him all the more reason to stare.
“I have an idea,” Sirius says, snapping his head back to Remus. Instantly, Remus breaks away from his trance and raises an eyebrow at the boy in front of him. Sirius is close—too close for his liking. He swears their noses could touch given one of them lean too close.
Remus motions for him to continue. “An idea. . . for?”
“Finding out who did this and how!” He points to his hair, then to Remus’. “I’m sure you want this to be fixed as soon as possible, don’t you?”
“Why are you only telling me?”
“Reggie won’t help, Barty and Evan wouldn’t take it seriously, Dorcas is. . . forget it. I just thought I could trust you with this the most.” The black-haired boy frowns. “I mean, it’s alright if you don’t want to. . .”
Squeezing his eyes shut and shaking his head as an attempt to get Sirius to stop rambling, Remus then pinches the bridge of his nose. Upon opening his eyes, Sirius just looks at him. “Hey, hey, I never said I didn’t want to—hell, I don’t even know what the plan is. Enlighten me.”
Instantly, Sirius’ eyes light up again. He then looks down at his robes and hesitantly pulls out some sort of golden device resembling—what? A necklace? Not exactly. Its centerpiece is too large in Sirius’ hands to be a necklace.
“This is a time-turner,” explains Sirius, and Remus just gives him a blank stare, to which the other boy sighs. “I wasn’t expecting you to know what this is because, frankly, I didn’t either before Professor McGonagall entrusted me with it. It uhm. . . sort of. . . turns back time?”
“What.”
Sirius tips his head to either side a few times and shakes his hand. “Professor McGonagall knew from Professor Slughorn that I wanted to take a couple extra classes, so she gave me this—” he dangles it around his fingers, “—along with a very thorough warning that if I am caught causing immense time-space problems with this thing I can very well be expelled, or sent to Merlin knows where.”
A month ago, Remus would never have guessed that Sirius Black, of all people, would be entrusted by McGonagall with a time turner.
I guess this reality is so much more different than I initially thought.
“So?” Sirius looks up at him, a slight expression of excitement painting his face. “What do you think?”
“Sirius, you’re going mad.”
“Yes or no, Remus?”
“To what? Going back in time to yesterday to—what? Catch the Perpetrators of the Kitchens?”
Sirius sighs into his hands. “Well, now you’ve made it sound like a poorly written book—”
“Fine, yes! I’ll catch the bloody perpetrators!” Remus facepalms. “Only because I can’t stand pink.”
And at that instant, Sirius grins at him and proceeds to warp the time-turner around both their necks, forcing their faces close to one another. Remus can’t help but stare the other boy directly in the eyes, before Sirius is forced to look away to click the time-turner about five times.
It almost makes Remus want to vomit, the way their surroundings set off in a backwards blur around them. Everything goes by so fast, yet it feels like about half an hour until they reach what looks to be six o’clock on Sunday—yesterday.
“Alright,” says Sirius so casually, as if they hadn’t just gone back in fucking time. He pulls off the time-turner around their necks and grabs Remus’ wrist, both heading towards the stairs to the cellars.
On their way there, Remus grumbles, “I don’t get it. You could’ve just done this yourself with no problem. What purpose do I even serve?”
Sirius hums. “I just thought you’d think the time-turner bit rather cool.”
“Well, yeah, I did, but—”
“Knew it.” Grinning, Sirius shrugs. “I also needed someone to be here just in case something goes wrong, and, as I said, I trust you the most with this.”
They make it down to the cellars, and after a few close calls in almost bumping into Filch and his cat, Mrs. Norris, they slowly creep into the kitchens, peeking through the keyhole and making sure they’d arrived before the perpetrators.
Sirius had timed it well, as the house elves had just called it a day half an hour before and all the students were down at the Great Hall enjoying their supper. As to not get caught, he pulls he and Remus into an empty closet, and leaves the door hanging slightly open to watch as the Perpetrators of the Kitchens make their entrance.
And so they wait.
They both sit opposite one another, knees to their chests, and gently grazing each other’s legs. It’s a bit silent for a while, though Remus doesn’t mind. The quiet is friendly at times. That is the case, until Sirius clears his throat and breaks that silence. “I talked to Reggie about leaving home.”
Oh.
Really, Remus doesn’t know what to say to that. All he does is feel the rush of warmth coursing through his body. Sirius is finally doing it.
“He—he wasn’t exactly opposed to the idea, as long as I didn’t leave without him. I still have to figure out a way to make that work.” Sirius rubs circles with his thumbs around his knees, looking to nothing but the floor. “Are you still open to us staying at yours?”
Without a second of hesitation, he answers, “Yes. Anytime, I’m always open. There’s always room for you. Both of you.”
Giving the other a soft smile, Sirius moves his gaze up to Remus. “Thank you, Moony.”
“When are you thinking of leaving?” he asks.
Sirius clicks his tongue and sucks in a breath. “Maybe early during the holidays. I have to talk to Reggie about that as well.” He grabs both of Remus’ hands, and internally, Remus’ mind races: What are you doing? What are we doing? What is happening? “I have a feeling none of this could’ve happened if you hadn’t come into my life. So, thank you, again.”
Despite himself, Remus smiles at him. “Don’t give me all of the credit. You’re the one being brave.”
“The prominent quality of a Gryffindor,” Sirius snorts. “Hilarious how that works.” He lets go of Remus’ hands.
“Oh, I apologize, am I being too much of a negative influence?” Remus raises an eyebrow, smirking.
Sirius rolls his eyes, elbowing him. “Yes.”
Just then, a faint shuffling came from the outside of the closet. Both of them instinctively peer through the tiny slit they left open, faces close. What Remus sees, though, is himself, entering the kitchens and grabbing a vase from one of the cabinets.
Fuck.
Sirius furrows his brows and grins cheekily. “Are you getting a vase?” he leans in and whispers, “For the flower I gave you?”
“Shut up,” Remus grits through his teeth.
The other boy raises his hands in mock surrender. “Just didn’t quite take you for the sentimental kind, s’all.”
“If you keep talking I’m snapping that plant in half tomorrow.”
All Sirius does to reply is widen his grin.
Just then, Remus accidentally knocks his head on a pot that rested against it. He hisses in pain; and before he could slap his mouth shut, eyes widening in the realization of how loud he’d just been, Sirius does it for him. Sirius glares at him with wide eyes also, very clearly mouthing, ‘WHAT THE HELL?’
The other Remus notices, slowly inching towards their closet with his arm outstretched to reach the doorknob. Before he does, though, he winces and takes a step back.
Thank Merlin.
When The Remus From Last Night finally leaves the kitchens, the two boys in the closet return to that deafening silence.
“Sorry,” says Remus, wincing as well, rubbing the back of his head. Sirius releases a breath he’d been holding for the past minute before playfully shoving Remus back. “Ow!” he exclaims, contradicting the laughter escaping his mouth. The two of them dissolve into a fit of laughter at the stupidity of it all.
“That could have been catastrophic for us,” the black-haired boy points out, rolling his eyes. “Imagine acknowledging another version of yourself from the future. We could have been arrested for that, actually.”
Remus shrugs. “Then thank fuck that’s over.”
A beat passes.
“Dunno if you remember, but if you and Regulus are interested and if it’s possible, perhaps you could come with me to James’ place the week of Christmas,” Remus brings up, fiddling with his fingers. He dares not to look at the boy in front of him straight in the eye. “We do it every year. Usually, you and—Pete and James go for a round of Quidditch, his mum bakes cookies with the help of Lily and I, the girls sing some karaoke. . .” Remus trails off, unsure of where he’s going with it all.
When he finally looks up at Sirius again, Sirius’ eyes are glossy. His voice is slightly weak when responding, “That sounds really nice. I’d like that.” He swipes at his eyes before giving Remus a soft smile and continuing, “I have a feeling Reggie would, as well. He needs it.”
“You both do,” says Remus.
Upon opening his mouth, though, Sirius’ response gets cut off by two individuals that enter the kitchens. The two of them instinctively look through the slit in between the closet entrance and are rightfully appalled by the sight in front of them.
“Is that—”
Sirius whisper-screams, interrupting Remus, “REGGIE?”
Regulus and James walk into the room. James cradles his cauldron in his arms, seemingly bubbling with something orange, while Regulus has his stirring rod in his hands.
“Thank you. . . uhm. . . again. . . for uhm—” James starts, fumbling over his words. Remus fights the urge to facepalm. “I appreciate it.”
Regulus visibly rolls his eyes, though a hint of an amused smirk rests on his face. “Think of it as a returned favor. Getting even with you for saving my arse.”
“It was nothing, honestly,” James brushes it off, waving his hands around, as if he wasn’t the one who concocted the plan to conjure up a creature and save Regulus from it a few days ago in the first place. “I’m sure you would’ve. . . done the same.”
Raising an eyebrow while reaching for one of the cabinets, he turns to face James and plainly says, “I wouldn’t have, actually.”
“Oh.” The boy in glasses frowns while placing his cauldron on a wooden table.
Regulus hides a smile from James, though crystal clear in Remus and Sirius’ line of sight. “But I’ll admit, it was admirable. The fact that I wouldn’t have done the same makes it all the more so.”
James’ stupid plan had worked.
And with that, Remus fights the urge to smile and pump his fist in the air.
Sirius furrows his eyebrows in frustration, whispering, “What the fuck is the meaning of this? Regulus has never spoken like this a day in his bloody—”
“Why, thank you,” James says, leaning against the table, almost knocking over a sack of onions, which makes Regulus snort. “Oops.”
Sirius leans in and whispers to Remus’ ear, “That’s the potion we’ve been working on for Slughorn.”
Remus fights a smirk at this new revelation. “James has already finished that potion.” Anyone could always count on James to completely re-do a potion he’d been working hard on in class to ask for Potions help from his crush.
“That bastard.” Sirius shakes his head, also fighting off a grin.
“Go get the Asphodels on the top right cabinet, since you could reach them better than me,” Regulus says, to which James does so right away. “They’re what we’re here for anyways.”
As Regulus chops up the Asphodels into intricate bits, James brings the cauldron from the table to the counter, where they could sprinkle the ingredient in with more ease. That turns out to be a mistake, as immediately, James’ grip on the cauldron falters for a second; and though he quickly regains his grip on its sides, a few drops of the potions lands on an open barrel of sugar right next to him. “Shit.”
Regulus snaps his head back to face James. “What could you have possibly done wrong?”
“I think a bit of the potion spilled into the. . . uhm. . . sugar?” James winces.
Regulus looks back at the Asphodels he was previously cutting, and Remus makes out the clear furrow in his brows as he pinches the bridge of his nose, a habit Remus shares when frustrated. He lets out a sigh. Then, he turns back to James. “It’s alright, it’s alright.”
“That is not my brother,” Sirius whispers to himself, still shaking his head in disbelief. “He would have murdered me for that.”
“We’ll get out of here when we’re finished and I’m sure it’ll be as if nothing ever happened,” reassures Regulus, a hand on his forehead. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” James nods.
In the span of the next five minutes, the two of them finish up the potion and Regulus, carefully, carries the cauldron out this time while James holds the door open for him. Remus swears he even saw Regulus smile.
“What now?” asks Remus, as both he and Sirius turn their heads back to each other. With his eyes wide and his mouth slightly hung open, Sirius is, seemingly, still shaken by the entire interaction.
“I’m going to have to have a talk with Reggie after this,” he says, staring down at his feet with his hands clasped together. “This is unnatural.”
Remus raises an eyebrow. “What? That they’re both guys. . . or?”
“No!” Slapping a hand on his forehead, Sirius squeezes his eyes shut. The darkness inside the closet almost makes his hair look slightly normal. “I mean it in the way that that’s Regulus Arcturus Black and James Whatever Potter, hanging out in a suspicious manner, whilst simultaneously causing the pink hair pandemic!” He covers his face with both his palms. Sirius’ voice is muffled into his hands, “It’s unheard of.”
“At least now we know what potion it is,” Remus notes, grinning at his suffering. “And, we know that that’s why Regulus was so against the idea of us playing detectives this morning.”
Sirius lifts his head up and just glares at Remus, though the slight smile on his face erases any hint of intimidation that could have had.
“Now we wait until morning,” he says, clicking his tongue. His gaze shifts to Remus, opposite to him.“Guess that isn’t so terrible.” Sirius lightly kicks at Remus’ legs.
“Maybe not for you, but I know I’m in for a night of torture.”
“Oh, come off it,” Sirius scoffs. “You love my company.”
“I wouldn’t say love. . .”
“What other word is there to describe it?” The older boy smirks. There’s a silence between them for a minute before Sirius breaks it by asking, “Remus, would you want to—”
Remus raises an eyebrow and motions for him to go on.
“Nevermind.” Sirius closes his eyes and shakes his head. “It’s stupid. Forget it.”
Not wanting to press any further, Remus swallows, smiles, and says, “Okay.”
“Okay.” The other boy smiles back.
And so, for the first time in a while, they spend hours in each other’s company without any petty arguments, miscommunication, and anything in between. The night goes perfectly.