Razor's Edge
Sirius stumbled into the bathroom, exhausted from a long weekend spent in training under the watchful eye of Mad-Eye Moody. The heat of the shower felt good on his still-aching body, and he enjoyed being well and truly clean for the first time in three days. Camping, even with all the amenities of a wizard's camp, was not for him. No, he liked his creature comforts, though he'd die before admitting it to James or Remus.
When he finished his shower, he wrapped a towel around his hips and stood at the mirror, which whistled slyly at him as he fumbled for his razor.
During their last year at Hogwarts, he'd become fascinated by the straight razor one of the Muggle-born boys had shaved with. So fascinated, he'd borrowed it one morning and made a mess of his face; he'd been nicked and cut and bleeding, muttering healing charms to himself when Remus found him.
For Christmas that year, Remus had given him a straight razor of his own, and a little cup and brush to mix his own shaving cream. When he and Remus ended up sharing a flat after they left school, he'd returned the favor, though Remus didn't need to shave as often, and preferred to do so with a charm rather than a razor. Pub workers were more likely to pull if they were slightly scruffy, Remus told him, and the one thing Remus had never had a problem doing was looking scruffy.
Sirius put his hand inside the medicine chest, feeling for the smooth ivory handle of his prized razor, and came up with something strange. It was cold and plastic, and not at all what he was expecting to find.
He pulled it out and stared at the grey plastic Muggle-made razor. He knew it didn't belong to him or Remus.
Which meant that someone else had left it there. He thought back to the last bloke he'd brought home, but it had been months ago -- he was in the last stages of Auror training and hadn't much time for a social life.
And he never went out with Muggles.
Remus did.
Except Remus didn't fancy men.
It was the saddest fact of Sirius Black's existence that when he'd finally fallen in love, he'd done so with a man who wasn't gay. He'd learned to hide his feelings, to protect the friendship. He'd even been stupid enough to believe that just being close to Remus was enough, that he didn't need anything more, that they could live together and go out with other people and it would all be fine.
Sirius had always shrugged off his mother's barbs about his intelligence, or lack thereof, but he was suddenly confronted with the fact that he was quite possibly the stupidest human being ever to have drawn breath.
He slammed open the bathroom door and stalked into the kitchen, where Remus sat, reading the "Evening Standard" and drinking tea.
He tore the newspaper out of Remus's hands and placed the razor down on the table with a precise click. His voice was harsh when he said, "What is that?"
"Looks like a razor," Remus said placidly.
"A safety razor."
"Yes."
Sirius put his hands on his hips. "Is it yours?"
"No. You know I use a shaving charm."
Remus was much too calm. Sirius knew he knew it drove him batty, but he couldn't help but rise to the bait. "Then how did it get into our bathroom?"
Remus shrugged. "One of our visitors must have left it there."
"I don't go out with Muggles and you don't fancy men."
Remus frowned. Finally, a response, and not that stupid, mild-mannered bollocks he'd been trying to pull off. It might have worked on McGonagall (and Sirius was the first to admit that Remus's calm under pressure had often been an asset while terrorizing Filch), but it wasn't going to work on him.
"Only half that statement is true."
Sirius Black was one of the cleverest wizards ever to attend Hogwarts. It didn't take him long to figure out which half.
"You said you weren't gay!" He was angry, but he could feel the treacherous tendrils of hope uncurling in his heart. And lower.
Remus took a sip of tea ('arch bastard,' Sirius thought) before replying, "I never said that."
Remus's calm was unnatural, and Sirius was determined to see him shaken out of it.
"You like women!"
Remus shook his head. The look on his face was amused and almost pitying.
"I never said that either."
"But, but--" Sirius was trying to wrap his mind around the idea that Remus was attracted to men. That Remus had, in fact, had some strange man in the flat while he'd been arsing about in Cornwall in the rain and the mud. That he didn't like Remus entertaining strange men in the flat; in fact, he liked it even less than he liked Remus entertaining strange women, which hadn't happened often, because he tended to sabotage the few dates Moony went on. None of them could possibly be good enough for Remus, and therefore must be routed before they broke his heart.
Sirius racked his brain for instances of Remus liking women, and came up with, "You had a thing for Lily!"
"We all had a thing for Lily, if you'll recall." Remus held out a hand. "Accio newspaper." The paper flew to him, and Sirius pulled it away again. He wasn't finished yet.
"But you went out with her!"
"For a week. When we were twelve."
"What about Maeve O'Riordan? Amelia Hart? Selene Montrose?" Sirius rattled off the names of girls Remus had fancied during their years at Hogwarts.
"I never actually went out with Selene. That was a favor to Peter, so her sister would go out with him. And even if I did go out with women, I would never go out with a woman named 'Selene.' " Remus seemed quite put out by this suggestion, and normally Sirius would have been amused by it, but this was too important to get sidetracked. "The others were before I had it figured out."
"But you do go out with women! There was what's-her-name, last year? The Harpies' Chaser with the big--" he mimed breasts, and Remus raised an eyebrow.
"Nancy Wallace? She fancied me. I did not reciprocate."
"You did not reciprocate." Sirius was having trouble making sense of that. "But when I told you about me, you didn't say anything. You didn't say, 'Me, too,' or 'I'll show you all the best places to go,' or, 'Now we can be together, Sirius.' And I did not just say that last one out loud, did I?" This was the problem. He was always letting his emotions run away with him, always speaking before he thought, while Remus just sat there, calm and controlled and --
But Remus was not calm any more. He rose and leaned forward, hands on the table, eyes intent. "What did you just say?"
Sirius flushed under the force of that gaze, and lowered his eyes. "Nothing."
"Sirius, did you mean what you just said?"
Sirius looked up and sighed. Remus wasn't going to let it go, and maybe it was just better to have it all out in the open. He could get over it and move on with his life. And find another flatmate.
"Yes," he said, raising his chin defiantly. Even he could hear the petulance in his tone.
And then he was being pushed back against the wall, Remus's lips hard and hot against his, Remus's hands sliding along his body, Remus's tongue in his mouth. He'd never ever thought kissing Remus would feel this good. And he'd thought about it a lot.
"Remus?" he managed when he was finally able to speak again.
"God, Sirius, do you know how long I've wanted to do that?" Remus leaned his head against the wall, his chin resting on Sirius's shoulder.
"I think that's my line," Sirius said, breathless, "but okay. How long?"
"Years," Remus said, lips moving against the sensitive skin of Sirius's neck.
"This isn't some kind of joke, is it? Prongs and Wormtail aren't going to pop out of the closet now, are they?" Sirius asked, desperately trying to keep his thoughts on the conversation instead of the interesting sensations Remus was producing by nibbling on his earlobe.
"I think I'm the one popping out of the closet," Remus said, laughing.
"Well, yes, there is that. How come you never told me?" He leaned his head back against the cool plaster, baring his throat in a vaguely canine gesture of submission.
Remus said, "I thought," kiss, "you knew," lick, "and weren't," a nip to his jaw that made Sirius arch and moan, "interested in me."
"Obviously," Sirius replied, threading his hands through Remus's hair and pulling his head up for a kiss, "you were wrong."
"Mmm, I see that now. You've shown me," and Remus's hands slid along Sirius's chest, sending jolts of electricity through him, "the error of my ways."
Sirius stopped his mouth with another deep kiss, reveling in the rough glide of Remus's tongue, the taste of Remus in his mouth, the feel of Remus's body -- lean and hard -- against him.
Remus broke away and with his lips followed the path his hands had blazed along Sirius's bare skin. Sirius moaned softly, rocking his hips into Remus's, hungry for closer contact and the friction it would bring. He slid his hands along Remus's chest and back, learning the shape and feel of firm muscle and strong bone. He closed his eyes and let sensation wash over him.
Sirius shuddered as Remus pressed hot, open-mouthed kisses against his stomach, and then he felt a breeze as Remus pulled the towel from around his hips, leaving him naked. The contrast between the cool air and the heat of Remus's mouth and hands on his suddenly bare skin made his knees weak, and he had to slam his palms flat against the wall to keep from falling.
Warm, strong hands grabbed his hips, and he opened his eyes to see Remus kneeling before him.
"Remus, you don't have to--" he said, barely able to form the words, because God, he wanted him to, had spent years imagining him in that position, soft, thin lips moving up and down his cock.
"I want to," Remus said, his voice hoarse and intense. One of those hands -- long elegant fingers with the nails trimmed short -- wrapped around Sirius's cock, and Sirius gasped. "And I think you want me to?"
Remus looked up at him, still stroking him firmly, eyes sparkling with mischief.
"Yes," Sirius managed, thrusting into Remus's grip.
Remus stopped stroking and Sirius whimpered.
"Yes, what?" Remus growled.
"Yes, Remus."
"That's better." He leaned forward, his breath sliding over the head of Sirius's cock, sending a shiver of pleasure down his spine.
Sirius thought his knees really would buckle this time as Remus took him in his mouth. Slick, wet heat engulfed him, and thought disappeared in the rush of feeling. Every touch of Remus's tongue, every glide of lips against flesh lit sparks beneath Sirius's skin, centering in his groin and radiating out.
"Yes, Remus. Please, Remus." He watched as Remus licked and sucked the length of his cock. His imagination had been good, but reality was a million times better. He was pure sensation, his whole body turned into liquid heat building to a climax so intense it felt as though his bones would turn to water.
He slid down the refrigerator and curled up against Remus, who was looking at him as if he were the biggest piece of chocolate in the world, or maybe the cure for lycanthropy. Sirius leaned over and nuzzled Remus's neck, while Remus's hands wound their way through his hair.
He burrowed in close, the evening air chilly against his overheated skin. That's when he noticed --
"You're wearing entirely too many clothes."
Remus laughed. "Am I now?"
Sirius liked the way Remus's eyes lit up when he laughed, how his whole face seemed transformed. He'd forgotten about that; there wasn't a lot to laugh about these days. Sirius resolved to make Remus laugh as often as possible. He also resolved to get Remus out of his clothes. He wanted to touch, taste, feel Remus's bare skin against his own, and he wanted it now.
"Yes," Sirius replied, fumbling with buttons in his haste to rid Remus of his shirt and then sliding his hand down to cover Remus's erection. "We still have... business to take care of."
"Business, is it?" Remus said dryly, but Sirius could tell by the tension in his body that he was anything but relaxed.
"Stop that, Moony." Sirius kissed him hard, and decided he quite liked the taste of himself on Remus's tongue. "Business is pleasure where you're concerned," he said when he was able to speak again.
Remus groaned. "There's only one way to shut you up, I see," he said, drawing Sirius close for another kiss. Sirius didn't resist, though the sheer joy he felt from kissing Remus almost made him lose his concentration and forget what his hands were doing. Remus pulled away for a moment. "You're a little slow tonight."
Sirius laughed but didn't disagree. He was still overwhelmed by the sudden change in their friendship. "Feeling a bit alpha, are we?" he answered, rubbing his cheek against Remus's stubbled jaw, still stroking Remus's cock through his trousers.
Remus's bark of laughter turned into a whimper when Sirius stopped fondling him. "Something like that, yeah." He pushed Sirius's hands out of the way and made short work of the zipper. When he had himself free of his trousers, he curled Sirius's fingers around his shaft. Sirius did not object in the least. "God, Sirius."
"About time you realized we're one and the same," Sirius whispered, paying close attention to Remus's responses as he settled into a rhythm. The feel of Remus's cock, hot and hard and slick with pre-come, and the urgent way Remus growled, made him hard again. He had a feeling they'd be at this all night, and tomorrow, and maybe the next week or hell, the next fifty years, before he was sated.
Sirius thrust against Remus's thigh, sending shocks up his spine, but all his attention was focused on Remus's face, learning what made him gasp and groan and close his eyes as if the pleasure were unbearable. Sirius had always been good at learning, had even enjoyed it, but classes would have been much more interesting if learning was always like this.
He pressed his mouth to Remus's neck, ran his tongue along his collarbone, needing to taste and smell as well as touch.
They moved together in a timeless moment that seemed to end all too quickly. Remus's hips bucked and he gasped, "Sirius." Sirius shivered at the intensity of his tone.
Sirius kissed him again, imprinting taste and texture on his memory as Remus came in his hand, against his body. Remus collapsed into him, mouth warm against his skin.
Hands slicked with Remus's come, Sirius finished himself off quickly, pleasure spiraling through him like a cyclone.
After a few more minutes of languid kissing, Sirius managed, with a great deal of wriggling and groping, to get the rest of Remus's clothes off.
"Okay, then, Moony?" he asked, raining kisses onto Remus's hair.
"Oh, yes." Remus lifted his head and smiled. "I love you, you know. I have for years."
Sirius's world turned upside down, or, maybe it was finally right side up. "I love you, too, Remus."
"Good."
They were quiet for a few moments, as Sirius adjusted his worldview to include a Remus who not only liked men, but loved him.
"Though I think you need another shower."
Sirius looked Remus up and down, mouth curving in a satisfied grin. "I'm not the only one. Care to wash my back, Mr. Moony?"
"Certainly, Mr. Padfoot. Will you return the favor?"
"It would be my pleasure."
Later, after they'd managed to wear themselves out and were lying in a contented cuddle in Sirius's bed, Remus said, his voice drowsy and warm, "You know, that was Peter's razor. He left it here after the last full moon."
"I'll have to thank him," Sirius replied.
"For both of us."
"Mmm..."