Author's Note:

A little AU! Set during Harry's fourth year some time before the third task, but nothing to do with Harry. Sirius is already living at Grimmauld Place, though only the small dining room is habitable. Remus has been avoiding him since the night of his return, but finally shows up with a brief update from Dumbledore. Mild, short-lived rage and angst ensues. Warning: Contains slash, rated R for suggestive themes.

If I had to choose a song that described the theme of this fic, it would be What About Us?, by John Barrowman, which you can listen to on YouTube if you don't know it.

This definitely isn't a songfic, but if I wrote one, it'd probably be inspired by that song.

Enough, anyway! Please leave a comment, whether it's praise or constructive critiscism. The following characters don't belong to me, etc etc etc. (And I wouldn't own Tonks if I was paid rent for her. Sorry, JKR.) D:

Remus rocks nervously on the balls of his feet as he lifts the heavy brass knocker on the door of number twelve, Grimmauld Place, glancing apprehensively at the curtained windows of numbers eleven and thirteen. The gods alone know what kind of magic was necessary to render this house so secret; it has taken him half an hour to get as far as this, even with Dumbledore's instructions.

The door creaks open an inch to reveal the sliver of a man's gaunt face, half-masked in shadow.

"Moony!" Sirius fairly yelps, his face splitting into a grin. "Bloody hell, and I thought you were avoiding me!"

"I'm here on Dumbledore's orders," Remus shrugs, feigning nonchalance. It isn't particularly convincing. "Hadn't you better ask me something?"

"Apart from where the hell you've been since the night Pettigrew escaped?" Sirius raises his eyebrows at his friend., drinking in the sight of eyes he hasn't seen in almost a year; hair he hasn't lost his fingers in for more than a decade and skin he hasn't - he breaks off from that thought. "Fine, fine, fine. The first time we snogged, were we in the Astronomy Tower or the Charms corridor?"

Remus feels himself go hot and cold at the same time.

"I'm here on business, Sirius," he manages, face flushed. "Don't you think you could be a little more…professional…about this?"

Sirius smirks wickedly. "It's definitely you. No Death Eater could pull off the awkward Moony look so well."

"Shut up," hisses Remus. "I'm serious."

If possible, Sirius' smirk gets wider. "Serious? Funny story, I thought that was me."

Remus doesn't smile. "Let me in, Black," he says, voice clipped.

Sirius stares, nonplussed, at the werewolf, then turns on his heel and stalks away down the hall. "Shut the door behind you," he bites out, good mood dissipating at his friend's inexplicable coldness, "and don't say a fucking word until we get into the back dining room."

As students, Remus remembers that it had been an unwritten law that nobody ever visited Sirius at Grimmauld Place during the holidays, and he can see why; even beneath the dirt and cobwebs cloaking the walls, the black wooden panels are oppressive and dreary, sucking the warmth from the air. A pair of moth-eaten curtains clinging to the wall seem to twitch as he passes them. He glances through several open doors along the long corridor; each room reveals a sight more dismal than the last. Moulding furniture and bookshelves grey with dust fill the abandoned, unwanted rooms, and something rattles unpleasantly in a chest of drawers when his shadow falls across it.

He thinks that if Dementors had houses, this would be the model.

Inside the large, rectangular dining room, he is relieved to see that in here it seems to be rather more habitable than the rest of the house. The walls are painted deep green rather than black and although the eighteen-person dining table is made of heavy dark wood and has four clawed feet tipped with tarnished silver, it is at least clean. The crystal chandelier, though overly ostentatious in design, lights up the long room well, although Remus cannot help but think it would be more pleasant if the great empty fireplace had something in it to warm the thick cream rug laid out before it. Presumably it had been procured by Dumbledore or someone, since Sirius could hardly go shopping, and it didn't look like it had spent the last ten or more years moulding away in an empty household.

Nobody says anything for several long minutes. Then -

"Is it about Harry?" says Sirius, his expression tense. "Did he find out what the third task might be yet?"

"No," sighs Remus. "It's not that anything has happened, per se. There are merely…rumblings…that all is not well with the Triwizard Tournament. Crouch has been ill - and we know he's never ill." He can't look at the ragged man before him.

"I know about Crouch," bites out Sirius, angry and confused as to why Remus won't look him in the eye and seems intent on staring a hole into the magically-polished wooden floor. "Harry mentioned it. What else?"

"Nothing solid," says Remus. He stands awkwardly, shabbily-dressed and looking quite out of place in the grand dining hall. "Rumours. Conjecture on Dumbledore's part, mainly. Karkaroff being surlier than usual. Snape's little tattoo looking darker. Things going inexplicably missing from the Potions cupboard."

"Hardly something to send you all this way for. You could have coded that into a letter. Or sent your head along by Floo." He glowers bitterly at his friend; the explosion of warmth in his stomach has been replaced by a block of cold, icy disappointment at Moony's reaction to seeing him. "Hormones and petty thievery at Hogwarts. It's nothing to go on, is it?"

"Dumbledore told me to come," says Remus flatly. He can feel Sirius' eyes on him and he hates it; hates this, hates the empty, fractured space between them and he'd close it if only -

"Oh, and now we listen to Dumbledore and not to me?" demands Sirius. "This is the first time I've seen you since Harry and Hermione helped me escape the Dementors, Remus! Where the hell have you been? I've been owling you constantly. So much for being my best friend, eh? So much for trusting me now I'm proven to be innocent!" He slams a fist down on the table, making it jump.

"In case you didn't notice, I'm not employed at Hogwarts any more," Remus shoots back, voice tight and controlled. "I haven't got the money to travel places, send owls, even stay temporarily in the Leaky Cauldron…I've been staying where I can!"

"You could have stayed here with me!" points out Sirius.

Remus curls his lip and looks pointedly around the room.

"Yeah, all right," snaps Sirius. "I know it's not ideal, but I'm working in it. I'm not a bloody house elf. And given I spent twelve years in Azkaban, this place doesn't seem so bad, you know? And I've got money, I could've helped you out…"

"I don't need your charity, Black." Remus grinds out the surname as though it costs him everything he has. "I don't need to take anything from you."

"You didn't mind taking something from me in every goddamn broom cupboard and secret corridor and hidden room we could find before I went to Azkaban for a crime I didn't commit!" bellows Sirius angrily. "You didn't mind taking it from me every time you came to my old apartment, or I to yours on that stupid motorbike! You didn't mind taking it from me on James' wedding night because you were upset that it couldn't be us fucking under a legal contract!" He is angry, shaking.

There is a sudden, uncomfortable silence. Memories of sweaty sheets and tangled clothing and broken promises crowd the air, suffocating them.

"That isn't what I was referring to, and you know it," mutters Remus, staring at his shoes. "And you don't have to make it sound so - so -"

"So what, Moony?" jibes Sirius. His eyes are wild now; his fists are clenched and it is all he can do not to punch the other man. "Make it sound so what?"

"Crude," Remus lashes back. "Don't make it sound so - unimportant - like it didn't mean anything to you!"

Sirius stares at him. "Unimportant?" he demands. "I'm making it seem that way, am I? Me? Did I turn up without warning at my best mate's house to deliver some message that I could've sent by owl and act like an uptight bastard, did I? You know, if you don't want to talk about us, if you didn't miss me, and I'm sorry for expecting you to after everything we said all those years ago, then fine!" He is shouting now, taking a step closer to Remus, leaning in to glare into the uncomfortable eyes of his ex-lover. "Pardon me if I thought you seemed to still care in the Shrieking Shack! Pardon me if I seemed to think the words of a man like Remus Lupin would still hold true after more than a decade! Pardon me if I thought I was getting my old life back! Pardon me if I thought I ever meant anything to you!"

"You think you're so hard done by, don't you, Black?" snaps back Remus. Their noses are barely more than an inch apart. "You think you're the only one around here who had to live through a private hell with no real friends and almost nobody who trusted you? You think you're the only one who had to spend most of the last year hiding from others?"

"I know it's difficult being a werewolf, Lupin!" bellows Sirius, spitting the surname from his lips. "I know!But at least you've got friends older than fifteen! At least the staff at Hogwarts are still your friends!"

"They trust you, too!"

"It's not the same, is it? You worked with them for a year. I was just taught by them; I was just the kid who always got in trouble and then left school and got in even more trouble, got in the biggest mess of my life because I went and trusted the wrong people…"

"Yeah, well, you're good at that, aren't you?" hisses Remus.

Sirius freezes.

"What exactlydo you mean by that?" he grinds out.

Remus looks him squarely in the eye for the first time. "You made them make Peter the Secret Keeper -" he held up a hand to stop Sirius' half-formed protest - "and you didn't tell me. And why didn't you tell me? Because you didn't trust me. All those times you had me in your bed…" He grimaces. "All that time, you thought I was a spy; you thought I was working for them. Ironic, really. I cared about you more than anything in the world - did everything for you - let you touch me, let you…" A ragged breath escapes him. "And really, you were the liar. It was you who told Snape about the Whomping Willow. It was you who swore you loved me whilst gently hinting to my best friends that I couldn't be trusted. It was you who came up with the idea of switching Secret Keepers and not telling anyone - not even Dumbledore. And you have the nerve to be angry with me, when I'm upset!"

They stare at each other, fists clenched, grey eyes matched evenly with black ones.

Sirius looks away first, visibly deflating as he sags against the dark wooden table.

"I didn't think you would do it willingly," he mutters. "I thought maybe you were under the Imperius curse, or…you know what the war was like, Remus…nobody trusted anyone-"

"Is that supposed to be enough?" Remus is still glaring at him with an expression Sirius has never seen; it's something akin to hurt and fury and frankly he looks like he's going to cry. "Is that supposed to be enough to make me think, oh, well, never mind then?"

Sirius can feel tears pricking sharply at his own eyes and squeezes them shut. He had been so stupid, assuming Moony would still want him back once he'd escaped Azkaban. Thoughts of Moony had helped keep him sane around the Dementors; in dog form, when they couldn't hurt him, he'd been able to lay his head on his paws and remember a better time, a happier time, a perfect time…

It looked like his old lover hadn't been quite so sentimental.

He squeezes his eyes together to stop the tears leaking out. God, he was supposed to be a man…really, and the Ministry still believed he was meant to be the one capable of murdering thirteen people with a single curse?

"Just go," he chokes out.

He can almost feel the bewildered expression on Remus' face, a mere foot from his own. "Sirius, what-"

"Just go!" he bellows vehemently; he can't stand the closeness, can't stand to have Moony this near him, hating him, probably wanting to hex him... "Get out! I know you hate me - don't need to stay and - bloody hell - rub it in!"

There is a very pregnant pause.

"You fucking idiot," Remus says clearly, and kisses him.

Sirius doesn't react at first, but Remus ploughs on, bruising Sirius' lips with his own, kissing him like he's a dying man and Sirius is his last hope for salvation; demanding everything and gives nothing, body grinding against Sirius with desperate aggression as the tears spill from his eyes.

Slowly, Sirius' brain grinds back into gear. Soft, sweet Moony has never been quite this desperate before, and Sirius realises with a shock that he likes it; more than that, he loves the way the other man is pushing him savagely backwards so that he arches over the table, one elbow supporting Sirius' weight as his hand seizes Moony's waist possessively and the other snakes up the human werewolf's chest, fingers gliding up Moony's neck and into his hair, bringing his head closer…

He kisses him back, their tongues vying for control and Remus makes a strangled sobbing sound and, supporting himself against the table with one hand, snakes his left hand under Sirius' crumpled black collared shirt, wrapping long, musician's fingers around his best friend's hips. He pushes his erection against his friend's groin, moaning audibly at the heated expression in Sirius' darkened eyes.

Sirius senses that Remus, though almost definitely thinking about it, doesn't want to shag him; not now, not here, with too many unanswered questions between them. For now, the reassurance his friend so desperately seeks comes from the thrill of dominating Sirius; fifteen years' worth of pent-up aggression and loneliness is poured into their kiss, and Sirius accepts all of it; accepts the tears mingling on their hot, flushed cheeks, accepts the cool fingertips digging into what little flesh remains on his hips, accepts the hot, uneven breaths of a gasping Remus on his neck as he pulls back and stares at Sirius wordlessly for what feels like far longer than the few seconds it really is.

"It's okay," whispers Sirius, pulling him into a tight embrace before releasing him and leading the shell-shocked werewolf gently over to the carpet and sitting him down, keeping one arm wrapped firmly around his friend's shoulders. One of them has to be coherent, after all, and he thinks it has been Moony's turn for far too long.

He pulls a wand from somewhere and mutters "Incendio," watching for a moment as the flames flicker into life in the fireplace. The wards should stop the smoke from leaving the chimney - at least, visibly - but he rarely risks it.

"Moony?" he says uncertainly.

Remus whimpers and curls up into a shaking ball against Sirius' chest, and for a glorious moment he can pretend they are sixteen again and discovering their intimacy for the first time…

He still smells the same, for God's sake.

"Moony, it's okay," he murmurs insistently into Remus' hair. "It's okay; it's okay…I'm sorry, Moony, I'm so sorry…" He feels the curled ball in his arms stiffen, and hastily adds, "No! Not for that - not for kissing you - never for kissing you…" He strokes Remus' cheek. "I'm sorry for being such a prat all those years ago…I know we've got a lot to talk about, but I swear, I did trust you, I did love you, I was just so stupid and so scared…"

Gradually Remus stops shaking and he uncurls enough to look at the runaway convict. "You did love me?" he says, a little uncertainly.

"What are you - yes, yes of course I did, I loved you for bloody years!" Sirius can barely hide his relief; if that was all Remus had doubted, then things would be okay…

"What do you mean, you did love me?" Remus asks doggedly.

Sirius stares at him incredulously. "What the hell are you talking about? I did love you; I was never using you, Moony, it was more than that…"

"Did," says Remus tiredly, "in the past tense?"

Sirius blinks.

"Oh," he says slowly. "Oh."

He sits up deliberately and kisses the werewolf very gently, brushing his lips faintly against the other man's slightly parted mouth. Lacing their fingers together, he presses Remus' hand gently against his chest so that he can feel Sirius' gently thudding heart.

"Did," he says firmly, "in the past tense, do, in the present tense, and always bloody will, in whatever tense means from this instant until the ruddy universe blows up." His expression is entirely serious. "Good enough for you?"

Remus doesn't even have to consider his reply.

Much later, when the fire has dimmed to a warm glow and the room is bathed in early evening shadow, they are still curled up together on the rug, each stroking the other's face tenderly.

Remus thinks of something.

"When you said always…" he hazards.

Sirius smiles drowsily at him. "Do you trust me?"

"Yes." Again, Remus doesn't even hesitate.

"Then, all you need to know is - I love you," is all Sirius says.

Remus looks at his friend for a long moment, and the smile that breaks across his face is like the first light of the sun, dawning over the Arctic after the six-month night.

"I love you too," he murmurs. "I love you too."

Mischief Managed!

Please review! Even if you disliked it!

Fox