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Carry On: hp_porninthesun Fic
Title: Carry On
Rating: NC-17
Pairing(s): Remus Lupin/Kingsley Shacklebolt; mention of past Remus/Sirius.
Word Count: 1150
Warnings: angst, hurt/comfort, sex, slash.
Summary: Naked, and alone, Remus stands. Without a backward glance, he rises from the mess of tangled bedclothes and walks to the window.
Author's notes: Just as a point of clarification, the scenes here shift between the morning after and the night before.

Naked, and alone, Remus stands and, without a backward glance, he rises from the mess of tangled bedclothes and walks to the window. He gazes out: past the splintered timber of the frame, and its flakes of peeling paint; past the accumulated dust, the sediment of so many lost years; past the glass pane and the lingering fingertips of the lost that cling to its surface.

Leaning forward, Remus rests his forehead gently against the window. He presses his palm – soft and warm – to the glass – hard, and cold.

Eyes cast downwards, he looks to the street below. Witches and wizards stride purposefully along; they nod in morning greeting, they wave.

They carry on.

Remus turns from the window. He looks over his bare shoulder, to the bed, but cannot withdraw his hand from the cool embrace of the window pane. His neck straining, he watches Kingsley sleep.

He watches the rise and fall of his chest, and the way the grey of the morning casts its glary light across the contours of his body; he watches the twitch of his limbs, legs long and lean, beneath the undulating landscape of twisted sheets.

Remus watches as his world crumbles around him: stone, rough and rigid, disintegrating into dust.

He cannot watch anymore; he closes his eyes.

In the self-imposed darkness behind his eyelids, images flicker. The curve of Kingsley's upper lip, the flash of brilliant white teeth; a smile. Elbows resting on the dining room table, leaning forward, close; too close, or not close enough ...

"Fancy another drink, Lupin?" Kingsley asks as he reaches for the pitcher in the middle of the table.

"Ah, no. I won't thanks, mate," he replies quietly, and a little uncertainly.

"Fair enough." Kingsley smiles. Amber liquid sloshes about in the bottom of the glass as he pours.

Gazing absently ahead, Remus runs a fingertip along the rim of his emptied tumbler; alcohol and saliva sticking to the skin.

"It's hard, isn't it?"

Hard. The word echoes in Remus' ears. It feels weak, flimsy, and entirely inadequate. It does not begin to describe his daily experience since the events at The Ministry. The worst thing, though – the very hardest - Remus thinks, is that it is getting easier by the day. In the moments when he no longer thinks of the past – of Sirius – it is almost unbearable. It is as though the very essence of the man is slipping away, trickling irretrievably from Remus' weakening grip, and his memories – the only thing for which he now truly cares – are little more than decaying relics waiting to be crushed under the boot of entropic decline.

"Remus?" Kingsley prods. His voice is thick, heavy; almost tangible in the silence of the moment. As though Remus could reach across and grasp it; honeyed, fluid ribbons of a comfort he had assumed lost.

"Hmm?" Remus says; Kingsley's voice recalling him to reality: to the musty air of the room, and the heat of the fireplace; to the weariness in his bones and the ache in his muscles, the fibres twitching and exhausted.

"It's hard for you," Kingsley says matter-of-factly, "Being here, in this house." He sips his drink while awaiting Remus' answer.

"Yeah. It's hard," he says, with a sigh. Remus looks up, and across at Kingsley: his dark eyes shining in the warm light of the room; his gaze, fixed and unwavering, staring back at Remus. Shifting in his seat, Kingsley reaches across and places a firm hand on Remus' leg: curving, and comfortable, across the expanse of Remus' slender thigh.

Remus swallows; his throat feels dry, his mouth suddenly leeched of all moisture. His heart pounds in his chest, beating a rhythm he'd dared not entertain: a rhythm he wasn't sure he'd ever feel again.

In a brief moment – a flash – the room falls away. The musty odour that hangs in the air, the warmth of the fireplace, the table and drinks; the guilt and the grief: gone, if only for the moment.

Remus leans forward and, with a courage he isn't sure he still possesses, presses his lips to Kingsley's. Kingsley, eyes momentarily widened in shock, reciprocates. He parts his lips and, pushing tentatively past Remus', their tongues, wet and languid and longing, entwine. Inching closer, Remus clasps his hand to the back of Kingsley's neck: hot, and smooth. Sweat beads on Kingsley's skin, slick against the palm of Remus hand.

With a deep sigh, Remus breaks the kiss. Silently, he rises and, reaching for Kingsley's hand, urges him to do the same.

Wordlessly, the two men climb the stairs: the aged timber flooring creaking underfoot, as though aching with the burden of their weight. As they enter the bedroom, Remus pulls Kingsley to him forcefully and they tumble to the bed, lips and tongues and hands lost in the pleasure of tentative exploration.

They move slowly, at first. Fingertips slip dexterously beneath clothing, skimming over expectant skin. Discarded clothes soon adorn the floor as their hands rove over the contours of one another's bodies – hard and soft, curved and angular, and all manner of textures in between. Their tongues spark with the taste of salt on skin; sweat and heat and the dirt of the day.

Remus' excitement builds. He grasps for Kingsley, needing to feel his weight against him; to feel another's desire as much as his own. Kingsley complies: positioning himself above Remus, he lowers his body carefully, till his cock is brushing Remus'. The two thrust gently and awkwardly against one another, the ache of barely touching more exquisitely painful than not touching at all.

Moaning and writhing, need overcomes Remus and he gropes frantically for his own cock. As he reaches between their twisting bodies, Kingsley bats his hand away and instead, grips Remus' prick firmly in the palm of his hand. He runs his hand along the shaft. As Kingsley loops his fingers, long and slow, over the straining head, Remus tenses beneath him and, with a guttural shudder that pierces the cacophonic panting that fills the room, he comes.

The sheets rustle from behind, and Remus is called back to the present. He opens his eyes; he shivers, his thin scarred frame cloaked only in the cold of the new dawn. He hears footfalls, soft and slow, but he does not turn from the window. Kingsley presses his own naked body to Remus', allowing his arms to drape across his scarred chest.

The two stand, silent but for the sound of their breathing, and gaze out of the window: past the splintered timber of the frame, and its flakes of peeling paint; past the accumulated dust, the sediment of so many lost years; past the glass pane and the lingering fingertips of the lost that cling to its surface.

Peering into the street below, Remus and Kingsley watch witches and wizards stride purposefully along, as they nod in morning greeting, as they wave.

As they carry on.