Title: Fascination
Author: ceredwen
Characters/Pairings: Remus/Sirius (unrequited), Sirius/hand
Rating: R
Kinks/Themes Chosen: Xenophilia: a sexual attraction to the exotic, strangers, or the unknown
Other Warnings: Masturbation
Word Count: 1156
Summary/Description: Remus is like nothing Sirius has ever known.
Author's Notes: Ugh. I had a spot of trouble getting this months piece to work for me. Actually, I started four, this is the fifth and I finally decided to just keep it simple. Thank you mods so much for letting me post late. Also thanks to whitmans_kiss for the beta.



Eyelids stationed at half-mast, expression still and smooth as a deep water lake before dawn, Sirius showcases boredom slick as a salesman experienced in his trade. Bright ember glows upon quiet inhale, smoke dismissed with perfect nonchalance.

One tree over, under the same warm Scottish sun, Remus reads away, seemingly unaware all around there is a school and children and birds and butterflies and Sirius. Which suits the aforementioned just fine, would rather defeat his cultured façade if someone dared draw near. It is the point, you see, to being prickly and unapproachable. Sirius is not all that he seems, or to put it another way, bored - not bored in the least.

Long, almost delicate fingers haven't turned a single page that Sirius missed; there has been not one scratch to the side of Remus' nose nor even a blink that has escaped Sirius' attention.

It isn't often he can do this so freely, watch in utter, rapt fascination. Not without James crowing over a Quidditch victory, or Peter whinging about a Charms essay or Lily hexing them one and all or Remus-

Come to think of it, Remus does a fair bit of watching himself, all quiet and deep, mouth turned up crookedly in amusement. Sirius is aware each time Remus' casual gaze flickers over him, because in between crowing over clever pranks, whinging about his home life, and hexing all and sundry, Sirius is watching Remus right back.

Nothing in Sirius' short, privileged life ever prepared him for a Remus Lupin, you see. Not his loud, obnoxious, bigoted family, or his poncy, prissy, spoiled brother, or his even more spoiled childhood friends. Never did he know that the most exotic, interesting person he would ever meet would be so only in stark black and white contrast to every bit of flash and pomp he had known before Hogwarts.

Eccentricity is de rigueur in pureblood families like his own where The Weirder, The Better is as much a family motto as Toujours Pur. Not one of them has ever thought that being pleasant and humble would stand you apart from the rest, so no one has ever tried it. In particular not Sirius himself, who took The Weirder, The Better prize for being the first Black to grace the Gryffindor Tower in three centuries.

James, self-important like any other wizarding princeling, wasn't the one who listened to Sirius' babbling, absorbing it all and tucking it away for safe keeping, big owlish eyes intent on Sirius the whole time. Remus never required the same in kind, never needed Sirius to hear his secrets in return. Remus became the repository for all things Secret and Important, the very best secret keeper of all. In return, he got every ounce of Sirius' fascination for that addictive, exotic quiet and calm that was as foreign to Sirius as Muggles and movies.

Of course, that was only first year, by the end of which Sirius' fascination had plunged headlong fantastically, spiraling frantically away like a pinwheel caught in an unruly wind. Sirius and the others knew Remus was a werewolf, and that took Remus' alien ambiance and threw it into orbit with Sirius running after like an eager puppy on a retrieve.

Which, as an analogy, amuses Sirius. Bizarrely foreign and inviting, Remus' sirens call had influenced Sirius' chosen form. After three years of poker-hot focus and concentration, he achieved the nearest approximation he could manage.

Dangerous is a laughably inadequate adjective to describe what howls in Remus' blood. It is the reason, Sirius had learned, for that painstakingly unobtrusive veneer that Sirius found so captivating. Too risky to draw unwanted attention, a feat which Sirius had handily managed for Remus, another byproduct of the bone-deep thrall Remus had over him. It was the unavoidable collision of an attention seeking hot-head, a nosy nemesis, and a secretive wolf who just wanted to get through his years at school in peace.

It took that incident, or rather, the consequences of that incident, for Sirius to realize what it all meant. Five years of obsession, willingly aided and abetted by the wolf that seeks your company at every opportunity, stings of icy rejection when that interest is abruptly taken away. The sloppy, easy warmth between them was locked into a block of ice, the planes and corners measured to perfection, impenetrable. The sheer, terrifying import, the depth of what he felt, knocked the wind from Sirius' lungs.

This was all made worse, of course, because he knew Remus felt it as well, or had. Being quiet and calm and not at all given to overt demonstrations of any kind, he had said nothing, and now never would. Which, unfortunately, only added to the allure, because then not only was Remus more exotic than a Veela's caress, he was just as unattainable.

Acknowledging what he felt had its own repercussions. Put into context, Sirius' fascination had turned to fantasy, imagined chancing upon Remus, perhaps reading under a tree, whereupon Sirius would satisfy that deep longing with a kiss.

He began to wonder what Remus would be like impassioned, if he became more primal as layers of humanity sloughed off and base instinct rose to the forefront. Did he pull and rip and tear; was he rough? Did he mindlessly need - rutting against Sirius like an ill-mannered dog? Was his serenity replaced entirely for a few moments of utter carnal indulgence?

Those thoughts had led him to Remus' bed, dorm empty during Quidditch or a meal; Sirius couldn't remember which. First, Sirius had opened the curtains, then pulled back the duvet and slid beneath the sheets. Face buried in Remus' pillow, Sirius had inhaled deeply and sighed.

The scent, Sirius had found, was unlike anything he had known, loamy and moist, like peaty earth, all heavy and deep with musk at the edges. He had known from Padfoot that Remus didn't scent as a human, but he had never experienced it for himself, at least not this close or this freely.

He had inhaled once more, this time with a hand rubbing over the needy bulge in his trousers, that heady, intoxicating smell popping along his nerves. More instinctual than touch, the scent had confirmed for Sirius the depth of the divide between himself and Remus, anchored it to his groin as he had rubbed faster, writhing wanton in Remus' bed. Reveling in his abandon, Sirius had opened the button on his trousers and lowered the zip. With that lovely, heady scent in his nose, that scent that howled of the exotic, the dangerous, the desirable, Sirius pulled on his cock, squeezing firm and stroking hard until finally he had exploded, 'Moony' a quiet utterance on his lips.

Eyelids flutter for just a moment as the memory washes through him. Another pull on the fag burns bright at the tip; Sirius watches closely as Remus, lost in his book, turns a page.