Chapter Text
“Snape, wait.”
I would recognise his voice anywhere. It sends a chill down my back, a mix of fear and excitement. Of life or death. It’s oddly gravelly, it reminds me of old smokers and film noir stars. My throat tightens and I turn around to face Remus Lupin.
He’s as tall as ever. Easily towers over me, and maybe it should scare me. But he’s so stringy and all elbows. The sharp angles of his bones make me wonder if they creak, or if that’s reserved only for his moonlight walks.
“What?” I snap, because I don’t know what else I’m supposed to say. We haven’t spoken, not since…
I swallow thickly and cross my arms over my chest. It hurts a little today, but this new salve helps. I wish I didn’t have to use it so much, but how else am I supposed to fit in my school uniform properly?
Lupin, somehow, looks taken aback by my tone. He drops his hand — did he really think I’d let him touch me? — and rubs the back of his neck.
“Can we talk?”
“Why? I’ve got nothing to say to you, Lupin.” I square my shoulders and straighten my back. It’s always when I’m standing next to Lupin that I notice how curved inward I always seem to be. Hunched in onto myself, as though it would hide all those imperfections I loathe.
“Please, it’ll only take a moment.” He looks around. “Unless you were busy?” And that bloody smirk is on his face, and I hate it.
I hate it because of the way it sends my stomach aflutter, like a low-powered Tickling jinx. It somehow highlights that stupid scar across his nose, and the one across his eyebrow.
But, for once, I have no excuse. So I shrug, and with a huffed sigh, lead him to an abandoned classroom. It’s draughty and cold, the air carrying a familiar scent of ancient dust. Most desks are broken, but there are a few chairs which still look sturdy enough. I don’t wait for Lupin and go to stand behind one of those chairs.
A bit of armour between us.
Lupin looks around, like he’s surprised to find himself here. Or maybe that’s just his face: perpetually surprised. Maybe it’s that scar on his eyebrow that gives him this permanent expression.
“What do you want?” I ask, because even though I’m not currently busy doesn’t mean I have nothing better to do with my time.
He sighs and rubs the back of his neck again. My eyes are drawn to the way his hair curls on his forehead. I hate how desperate I suddenly am to touch it. See if it’s as soft as it looks. Nothing about a werewolf should look soft but Lupin, as always, defies all logic.
The boy steels himself and the famed Gryffindor courage makes an appearance.
“I didn’t know you spent Yule break at Hogwarts.”
I blink once. Twice. What?
This isn’t what I expected. Is Lupin stalking me, somehow? Why would he care where I spent my previous Yule breaks? I chew on my cheek and ignore the bile sliding between my teeth. Don’t think about home, Sev. Don’t do it.
“What’s it to you anyway?” I challenge with an unaffected air, because that’s all I can say without spilling my guts. My hands grip the back of the chair. “I have a lot of studying to do. Slughorn’s given me extracurricular assignments.”
Lupin tilts his head, eyebrows rising further. I can’t help looking at that stupid scar.
“Oh, that’s nice of him. I thought…” He bites his lip and looks away. “It’s just that, well, I heard from the Slytherin Prefect in our year—”
“Spying on me, are you?” I drawl, my fingers whitening with how hard I grip onto this armour of a chair. My heart shouldn’t be racing like this, not for bloody Lupin. Fuck.
“What? No, no.” Lupin takes a step forward, as though the chair wasn’t there at all. As though he could reach me if he tried hard enough. “I wanted to sock the bastard, Snape. He said your father—”
“Don’t you mention my father to me,” I spit, growing anxious and unsettled despite myself. I try to stop my shoulders from trembling but my hands are holding onto this last piece of armour so tightly. I can’t let go. “Don’t, Lupin.”
“So it’s true then?” he asks, softly like a sheep. As though he could fool me, as though it’s so easy to forget that he’s really a wolf.
“I don’t care what you think, Lupin.” I wish my voice didn’t sound so fucking weak.
“Snape— Severus, I…” he hesitates and for the briefest moment, something golden flashes through his amber eyes. “I understand.”
It’s a confession and we both know it. I take a shaky breath and look away. I can’t be here, I can’t let this stupid wolfish boy, one of Potter’s sycophants, get to me like this. Not after last year. Not after the whole bloody school saw… I shut my eyes tight and shake my head.
“Get away from me.” It takes all my willpower to say those words, and by god I wish I meant them.
Lupin clearly hears what I can’t say, and I hate him for it. I loathe this boy. His hand, warm and scarred, covers one of mine. I refuse to open my eyes, even when I feel his thumb rubbing the tension in my wrist, even when his other hand covers my other hand. Even when his hands, so large and covered in scar tissue, slide up to wrap around my wrists. I know he can feel my pulse beneath his fingertips.
It terrifies me.
“What are you doing?” I manage to whisper. I’m stuck between wanting to shove him away, curse him until he bleeds — and allowing the contact to continue, because fuck. Fuck.
“I’ll stop if you tell me to,” he says, and somehow he’s gotten closer. His breath smells like spearmint and it fills my mind like hot air in a balloon. “Do you want me to stop?”
“No.”
I don’t know where this sudden desire comes from. It’s unfamiliar, it’s cloying my chest, and it makes me feel like a softly simmering cauldron.
“Severus.”
It’s the way he says my chosen name, my wizard name, that prompts me to open my eyes at last. It’s reverent and simple, it’s the way I wish everyone said it. It’s the first blossoms in spring and the refreshing showers of April. I can hardly breathe and air doesn’t even matter when I feel so…
Lupin smiles that murderous little smile of his. It upsets the scar across his nose, and it dimples his left cheek only. I want to fall into the warmth of his smiling eyes and never come back. It’s upsetting, because now my grip loosens from my only piece of armour, this stupid chair, and Lupin’s fingers dance on my inner arm.
“I apologise,” he whispers, “for what happened last year. They don’t understand, and I’m tired of trying to make them see why it was so awful.” Lupin takes a shaky breath, inhaling all the air between us. “I’m so sorry.”
And I don’t know why I do it, I don’t know why it affects me so much. Maybe because no one’s ever apologised to me before. Maybe because this means there’s a chance I didn’t deserve this violence. His apology doesn’t fix anything, doesn’t give me back a home to go to, and it certainly doesn’t make me forgive anyone.
But it makes me feel warm. So I lean in and kiss him.
It’s awkward and my stupid, ugly nose is too big against Lupin’s, but then he tilts his head and oh. It’s close to perfect. It’s soft, his lips are so warm. I feel his hand move up my arm, gripping my elbow, and he gently nudges me closer. The chair that was between us is gone, and his hand is suddenly on my hip. Lupin has superhuman strength, I know he does, but the way he touches me — it’s like I’m made of glass. Like I’m something precious he fears might break if he holds on too tightly.
I groan in annoyance and press myself against him, my newly free hand grabbing his tie. He’s so bloody tall, he’s nearly bent in half, but I don’t care. I bite his lip and pull harder on his stupid Gryffindor tie. I feel him laugh between our lips, and between one moment and the other, my tongue is in his mouth to shut him up. It’s graceless and probably makes for a terrible kiss, but bloody hell if he doesn’t kiss me back. His tongue is hot and wet, and that simmering cauldron in my lower body boils a little more strongly.
I’m not sure I like how this feels, this… arousal. It feels wrong, like something is missing. I hate it but I don’t want this to stop, I don’t want Lupin to think I’m a freak who can’t stand getting horny—
Everything inside me freezes when Lupin’s hand moves up from my hip. Up and up, and up a bit more until his thumb grazes the underside of my—
“Stop.” I pull away, breathless and flushed. My heart beats a furious staccato in my chest, where Lupin’s thumb nearly brushed, and I can’t stand it. “Don’t touch me.”
Lupin’s hands immediately fall away and he raises them in surrender. His stupid face is pink and it really makes his scars stand out, their whiteness striking. He’s never looked so tender. “Sorry, I’m sorry.”
It’s irrational. I know it’s irrational. I know he didn’t mean to grope my chest, I know he was being careful. But I can’t fucking help it. I wrap my arms around myself, another piece of armour, flimsy as it is.
“Whatever.”
The sadness in his amber eyes is more than I can stand.
“Look, Lupin.” I look away though, unable to meet his eyes. Unable to stomach the rightful disappointment I’d see there. “Just leave me alone.”
“Severus…” It’s not displeasure in his voice, it’s a much worse chagrin. “Alright. Just…” he sighs and with the sound of ruffled fabric, I imagine he’s rubbing the back of his neck again. “I’m sorry. I won’t bother you again.”
He leaves. It’s what I wanted, it’s what I asked him to do — to leave me alone. I’m better off alone, always have. I always fuck things up. I’m too much of a bloody aberration even for the fucking school werewolf.
I just wish it didn’t hurt so much.