FIC: CITY OF AQUATINT FOR CHIRALOVE

[veeagainst.livejournal.com]

Title: City of Aquatint
Author/Artist: veeagainst
Recipient: chiralove
Rating: PG/PG-13
Contents or warnings (highlight to view): Minor schmaltz, inexplicable non-winter setting.T WARNINGS HERE
Word count: 5225
Summary: After they leave Hogwarts, Sirius goes to visit Remus, who is studying in Oxford.
Notes: Thank you to usernameshlomo for the beta read, which I found incredibly useful. Any typos or other issues are entirely my own. chiralove, I hope you enjoy it, and happy holidays!

“Oxford, in those days, was still a city of aquatint… the rare glory of her summer days - such as that day - when the chestnut was in flower and the bells rang out high and clear over her gables and cupolas, exhaled the soft airs of centuries of youth.”

― Evelyn Waugh, Brideshead Revisited

Samuel Johnson once wrote, ‘When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life’, but after a long, dark, and cold winter – the first of his post-Hogwarts life – Sirius Black was absolutely weary of London. Shattered, drained, exhausted, fatigued, whatever adjective you wanted to assign to it, he had felt it; had been feeling it since mid-February or so; and now that it was early May and winter’s death grip seemed set upon clinging on to the grey old city for the indefinite future, he was ready to go elsewhere with all possible haste. Holding a bag, on the first day of a four-day bank holiday weekend, he made his way to his local Floo station, bound for the golden walls, green quads, and dreaming spires of Oxford.

Sirius had been hoping to head directly to the Potter family’s country house, Herts’ Haven, which lay in the countryside somewhere in that nexus of rolling fields and ancient privilege between Chipping Norton, Burford, and Woodstock. James, however, was unable to make it until Friday night. After lengthy negotiations and many exhausted owls, Sirius, James, and Peter had agreed to meet at the house on that evening for a weekend of debauchery. Remus, who was reading for a degree in Defensive Magic at St Cyprian’s, one of Oxford’s two magical colleges, had insisted that, with his first year exams approaching, there was simply no way he could attend.

Sirius found this excuse unacceptable. After further communication with James, he had decided that he would be showing up mostly unannounced in Oxford to persuade Remus to come out for the weekend. He wrote Remus a note from the queue at the Floo Station and sent it off to Oxford.

Twenty minutes later, Remus met him outside the station, cheeks flushed and hair curling at the edges in a way that reminded Sirius of a Botticini angel.

‘Thanks for giving me some bloody notice,’ Remus gasped, bending over and putting his hands on his knees to catch his breath.

So maybe the halo is a bit askew, Sirius thought. ‘You’re welcome,’ he said, grinning. ‘Thanks for coming to collect me.’

Remus straightened up, still breathing hard, an expression on his face that Sirius read as exasperated but fond. ‘I already told you, I’m not going out to James’s. So I can’t imagine why you’re here,’ he raised an eyebrow, ‘unless you’ve got some other motive.’

‘I have no idea what you could possibly mean,’ Sirius said airily. ‘I wanted to come out to see you. I’ve never been to Oxford and you’ve been here nearly eight months. It’s a...’ He referenced the tourist map he’d collected from a stand inside the station. ‘”It’s a cabinet of curiosities disguised as a city, about which William Butler Yeats once wrote, ‘I wonder anybody does anything at Oxford but dream and remember, the place is so beautiful.’”’ Sirius stopped reading and delivered a winning smile. ‘Sounds like a great place for me to come for a few days of holiday.’

Remus smiled back sardonically. ‘This all seems terribly, well, cultural, Padfoot.’

‘So?’ Sirius asked, mock offended. ‘I like culture. I went with you to the V&A{C}[1]{C} that time.’

‘I asked for that as my dying wish. When I had that awful cold. You asked me what I wanted most of all in the world and I was delirious and I told you that it was to see the Roman art at the V&A with you.’

Remus had been babbling about Latin something and Victoria something and coughing constantly, up from Oxford for a weekend back in January. He’d been staying on Sirius’s couch. Sirius had asked him what he wanted to do and then had dragged him out in the hopes of not becoming infected in the enclosed space of the flat. Of course the day Remus had left, he’d come down with it, and had been depressed and alone and without a Roman art viewing companion.

‘So,’ he said, ‘I like doing cultural things with you even when you’re going through handkerchiefs at an alarming rate. Plus, it’s sunny here. And I heard that we can take a boat out on the river.’

‘Well, I have an essay due this evening,’ Remus said, though his eyes sparkled, ‘so you can explore on your own while I go to the library and then we can go punting{C}[2]{C}.’

‘I’ve got a better idea,’ Sirius said, sensing a crack in Remus’s armour. ‘I came here to see you. I’ll go to the library with you and we’ll knock this essay out.’

At St Cyprian’s, they left Sirius’s things and acquired something Remus called a ‘Bodcard’{C}[3]{C} from a neighbour of his whose blurry ID photograph could maybe have passed for Sirius on the worst hair day of his life. Remus had looked from Sirius to the photograph several times, something very close to a smirk on his face, and declared that it would do, much to Sirius’s outrage.

Luckily, neither the librarian in the Bodleian’s immense and low-lit stone entrance hall nor the librarian at the wood gate to the also low-lit Duke Humfrey’s Reading Room{C}[4]{C} bothered to give the card more than a cursory glance. Remus collected a large book from the second librarian and when she looked at Sirius, Remus said, ‘Oh, we’ve got the same tutor, so we’re going to share,’ and then led Sirius back into the stacks. They took a seat at a narrow wooden table with books chained to the shelves behind it.

‘What are we looking up?’ Sirius hissed as Remus opened the book.

Silently, Remus pulled a sheet of parchment out of his bookbag and passed it to Sirius. The typewritten ink on it had that purple sparkle to it that suggested wizardry. It read: ‘Choose one question to answer in an essay of no fewer than eight inches.’

As Sirius held it, Remus leaned across him and, putting his hand onto Sirius’s to steady the paper, circled the top question: ‘Should there be a legal distinction between Humans, Dark Creatures, and Magical Creatures? Take into account current legal standards and the work of the authors listed below.’ Sirius read further and then lifted up the cover and squinted at the title: Baldwin’s Guide to Creature Legislation, 1975 Edition. It was top of the list. Lovely; Sirius had always had a soft spot for any kind of magical creature, Dark or otherwise. He pulled a quill and small ink jar out of his pocket, ready to take some notes, but Remus hissed and shook his head.

‘No ink allowed in here,’ he mouthed. He held up his pencil and tapped it once on the wooden table, then handed Sirius the identical copy that had appeared. Sirius took it and twisted it around.

‘Why not?’ he whispered.

‘Mark up the precious manuscripts, I suspect,’ Remus whispered back. ‘I got kicked out because of it on my first day.’

‘Seems like something you should have been warned about by an older student,’ Sirius said, and Remus shrugged.

Several pages in to the book, he was outraged.

‘This is such tosh,’ he spluttered at Remus. ‘I don’t want to have to read someone’s completely prejudiced thoughts about werewolves. And you shouldn’t have to either.’

Remus grinned. ‘But how are we going to refute his argument if we don’t know what it is?’

Sirius opened his mouth to retort, but then heard footsteps. The librarian prowled down the aisle to their left and they shut up automatically and bent over the book, close enough that Sirius could feel Remus’s curls on his ears, forming a tableau of studiousness until she passed. Then they broke into mostly silent giggles.

‘Nothing changes,’ Sirius whispered, comforted by the thought, and Remus grinned.

The essay was delivered to the tutor’s pigeon hole at St Cyprian’s by teatime and Remus, obviously more at ease, suggested that they go punting. They walked to a little jetty on the northwest side of Magdalen Bridge under brilliantly warm sunshine. Remus explained the theory of punting as they walked, and gave over responsibility of the punt once they’d arrived at the boathouse. Holding the long pole for guiding the punt, Sirius stepped nervously into its the low end – not walking to the other end to stand on the box, as that’s how they do it at Cambridge, Remus had explained – and dropped the pole into the water, giving it an experimental push. He almost fell out the back of the boat as it glided forward and slammed into another punt emerging from under the bridge. Steadying himself, he glanced back and saw the men on the dock laughing at him.

‘Watch yourself,’ the pilot of the other punt yelled.

‘Oh, they’re utter twats,’ Remus said, but Sirius’s ego was bruised. He gave Remus a beseeching look and Remus immediately stood and took the pole from him. ‘Go look in there,’ he suggested, indicating his bookbag on the faded red cushion in the centre of the boat. ‘I’ll get us out of the bridge area, it’s always a disaster.’

Grateful, Sirius slunk off to sit down. Remus gave them a much smoother, more powerful push and sent them north up the tree-lined river Cherwell. Inside the bag, Sirius found a mystery novel by Dorothy Sayers, a bottle of white wine, and a punnet of blueberries.

‘Read something to me,’ Remus requested, and Sirius opened the book – Gaudy Night – to its bookmark and started to read aloud. Remus deftly manoeuvred them around another punt that was dawdling back and forth across the river and added, ‘Oh, and keep the oar handy, just in case you see some geese or swans who look like they’re hungry.’

Setting down the book, Sirius grabbed the small wooden oar from the box and looked around alertly. It was moments like this – when there were small animals to be menaced – that his canine nature reared its head and – oh. He saw a swan. It was cruising down the river trailed by cygnets looking like the Royal Navy. In the face of it, Sirius felt rather like the Swiss might do at sea. ‘My God, that thing is huge. What do they feed them? Undergrads?’

‘Visitors,’ Remus replied breezily, ‘and I suspect dogs, as well.’

After punting through trailing willow branches into a side channel, they wound up docked in a private curtain of new spring leaves alongside the Magdalen Fellows’ Garden, drinking wine and popping handfuls of blueberries into their mouths until their tongues and teeth are stained blue. They traded the book back and forth, reading the story of Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vane{C}[5]{C}, until the bells of Magdalen tower tolled for 6:30 and Remus sat up reluctantly – he’d been lying backwards across the box for some time now, trailing his fingers in the water as he read – and said that they should get ready for dinner.

Sirius had been watching him as he lay there, pleasantly tipsy and mesmerised by the ripples Remus’s fingers made in the water. Since Hogwarts, he and Remus had spent much more time alone together on the odd weekend in London than they ever had done before. It was rather quieter, without the other two, but it had never felt like something was missing.

‘Here,’ Remus said now, standing and holding out the pole. ‘Have another go at punting.’

‘Ok, Sirius said, unsure. He stood up also and the boat rocked; he flailed and Remus reached forward and caught him, holding his arms until the boat steadied.

‘Ok?’ Remus asked, smiling. ‘It’s impossible to tip these things.’

‘I don’t know,’ Sirius said, doubtful, letting Remus hold him until he was absolutely certain that they were secure. Then he accepted the pole and made another go of it. For ten minutes, they zigzagged across the river, Remus averting their course with the oar every time they drew near to hitting a bank. Sirius slowly got the technique – using the pole as a rudder, keeping it straight up and down when he pushed – and by the time they made the turn around the island, went under the first bridge (both crouching down, avoiding the cobwebs and their eight-legged inhabitants who clung to its underside), and entered into a shallow and narrow watercourse alongside the main bulk of Magdalen College, Sirius was starting to feel confident in his abilities. Remus was lazing back against the faded red cushion in the centre of the boat, finishing the wine and complimenting him on his style when he dropped the pole in and then couldn’t draw it up again.

Panicked, he held onto it as the boat continued to move away; he was jerked backward by the pole and tumbled into the water. It was barely knee deep, but he landed hard on his backside and got soaked to the neck. For a second he sat, stunned, and then Remus was up and holding an end of the oar out to him. He took it and the punt stopped.

‘Oh,’ he said. ‘This water is really quite cold.’ He wrung out a sleeve and gave Remus a pathetic look. ‘I’m crap at punting.’

Remus frowned. ‘I think that was bad luck.’ He tugged on the oar that Sirius was holding and pulled the punt back to the pole. He struggled briefly to extricate it, eventually pulling it free and bringing up a clump of roots. ‘It got caught. Could have happened to anyone.’

‘Maybe.’ Sirius was miserable; he didn’t fancy going back past the laughing men at the jetty soaking wet. Remus, apparently sensing that, said, ‘Here, you can climb up onto the next bridge and walk out through Magdalen. I’ll take the punt back and meet you outside.’

It was a good plan, and it would have gone off without a hitch except, once Sirius had climbed over the bridge in his soaking clothes and walked under the ornate metal gate into the college grounds, he found himself in the middle of a black-tie garden party. He saw a waiter approaching with a tray of champagne and a nasty look and ducked sideways into the cloisters, then darted towards the grassy quad to conceal himself behind a pillar. Five minutes later, when he was passing the time by contemplating what a nice reading voice Remus had – a little bit hoarse, animated and kind-sounding – Remus found him hiding out underneath two frowning gargoyles. He had produced an umbrella from somewhere, which he held out over Sirius’s head as he took his hand and pulled him to his feet; it had started to rain.

They had dinner in St Cyprian’s hall, which looked so identical to the one at Hogwarts that Sirius almost checked around for Professor McGonagall’s stern face. As they took their places, standing by the tables, waiting for High Table{C}[6]{C} to file in and begin the meal with the college prayer, Sirius surveyed the students around them. Nominally, St Cyprian’s took students from all Hogwarts houses and any foreign schools, but Sirius knew that Oxbridge, despite overtures made towards attracting more scholarship students like Remus, was still largely the domain of the old families.

‘Benedictus benedicat,’ intoned a member of High Table, and the rest of the hall, minus Sirius, called back, ‘Deus illuminabit me et tuere me ab draconibus. Amen.’ The Fellow rapped a small hammer on the table and then, with a vast scraping of benches, they all sat.

Remus turned to say something to Sirius, but the young man across from them suddenly leaned forward. ‘I say, aren’t you Sirius Black?’

‘Yes,’ Sirius said, as Remus began, ‘Oh, I should have introduced you…’ but the man had already turned to his companion and said loudly, ‘Imagine, giving up the Black family inheritance.’

Sirius felt Remus’s entire body stiffen against his; out of the corner of his eye, he could see that his friend’s jaw was suddenly clenched. That gave him courage, so he laughed. ‘Imagine,’ he said, just as loudly, catching Remus’s eye, ‘having some principles.’

Beside him, Remus relaxed and laughed too.

The weather remained appalling the next day. Sirius lurked in the St Cyprian’s library, reading Colin Dexter’s Last Bus to Woodstock (liberated from Remus’s desk) while Remus spent the morning in a tutorial, but after lunch in hall, the rest of Friday stretched out before them, until six, when Sirius was supposed to Floo to Herts’ to meet James and Peter. Sharing an altogether too small umbrella, Remus took them to the tiny art gallery in Christ Church College (approximately five minutes of things to see), then to the desert hothouse in the Botanic Gardens (‘At least it’s warm in here,’ Sirius had shivered as they’d stood with shoulders touching in the small space), and on to the Museum of the History of Science (where Sirius had declared that he a. had had no idea that there were so many astrolabes and b. really did not care).

They’d set off again, huddled together under the umbrella, wandering aimlessly up Catte Street with a vague idea of finding a teashop, when Sirius noticed a curving stone bridge over the street to his left.{C}[7]{C} ‘Hey,’ he asked, ‘can we go see that?’

Remus stopped and frowned. A large group of tourists were taking photos beneath it, all wearing brightly coloured macs and speaking loudly in French. ‘It’s not my college so we’re not technically supposed to go in there…’ Remus glanced at Sirius and raised his eyebrows.

‘Did that ever stop us?’ Sirius asked. ‘Though I suppose we don’t have an invisibility cloak.’

‘We can have the verbal equivalent,’ Remus suggested, and led Sirius beneath an ornate wooden carving of flowers and through the gates of the college. He paused in the entryway and scanned a noticeboard listing the fellows of the college just as a black-hatted porter[8] emerged from the lodge and growled, ‘Can I help you lads?’

‘Yes, please,’ Remus said politely, turning. ‘We have a special tutorial with Dr Smith? In Early Modern History? I just can’t remember his room number.’

‘Staircase one, room 203,’ the porter said, and Remus led Sirius out of the entryway quickly. He veered to the left to a doorway with a keypad.

‘Uh oh,’ Sirius said. ‘Any guesses on the code?’

‘None whatsoever,’ said Remus, and then he dropped his bookbag so that all the books spilled out a little too neatly and bent down to retrieve them.

‘Good thing this is a Muggle college,’ Sirius chastised him, bending down on the pretext of helping him. ‘Because that was obviously a diversion.’

‘Shh,’ Remus said, looking mischievous as a group of giggling girls swung open the door. Remus stood with his bag and held the door open for them, smiling and catching the eye of the prettiest of them – Sirius frowned at her – before stepping inside, followed by Sirius.

‘Admit it, you’re impressed.’

‘Did you know that girl?’ Sirius asked, looking back after her, not sure why he was annoyed.

‘Never seen her before,’ Remus said, but Sirius kept looking after her, until he felt Remus’s hand on his arm. ‘Not planning on seeing her again, either,’ he said, catching Sirius’s eye, ‘but she did manage to make it look for any watching porters like we belong here.’ He let go of Sirius’s arm and looked around. ‘Now then, I think this is the right staircase.’

They walked up some stairs and through a swinging wooden door to stand in the middle of the bridge. The view was beautiful: the grey tower of New College and the sea-green dome of the Sheldonian and the imposing castle shape of the Bodleian all gained new perspective with the added height. Remus leaned back against one stone wall of the bridge and propped himself up on the ledge, so Sirius leaned back against the opposite ledge.

‘Thanks for showing me around,’ he said. He wanted to tell Remus that he missed him, in London, but it seemed like an awkward thing to say. He’d let on to James once how much he missed Remus and James had been taking the piss ever since.

‘No problem,’ Remus said, smiling. They stood in companionable silence for a few minutes before Remus said, ‘It’s really nice to have a friend here.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Oh,’ Remus said, shrugging, ‘it’s just, most people here are already in their own cliques. They’re rich. Or they knew someone from school. I’m the only Gryffindor from our year here. And no one knows about, well, you know.’ He looked up and mimed howling at the moon, which made Sirius laugh. ‘So it’s nice to have you here. I can be myself with you.’

A group of students came onto the bridge, laughing and talking loudly. Sirius crossed to stand beside Remus so they could pass, and once they had gone, he stayed where he was, facing out towards the turrets and towers of Broad Street. ‘I know the feeling,’ he confessed. ‘I mean, not quite. But you know. People know me as Sirius Black, the one who got disowned.’

‘People can be utterly awful,’ Remus said gently.

‘They’re ok,’ Sirius replied, shrugging. Rain pelted the windowpanes with such strength that it sounded like someone was flinging a bucket at them. Sirius watched the water race down the small panes to pool at their lead edges, overflow, and fall further. He licked his lips. ‘They’re just not, you know, friends.’

‘Yeah,’ Remus said quietly. Sirius turned his head to look at Remus. He licked his lips again, noticing for the first time that Remus was his same height.

He realised that what he wanted was to kiss Remus on the mouth.

So, without thinking, he leaned forward and did just that. Remus’s mouth was warm, and soft, and yielded almost instantly. Sirius leaned into him, breathing him in, startled at how good this felt. Then he heard voices coming toward them and jumped back.

Remus’s eyes were enormous. Sirius stared back at him, sure his own eyes were also enormous, because what on earth had he been thinking, and then Sirius heard the porter’s voice and Remus lunged forward, grabbed Sirius’s hand, and dragged him down the stairs off the other side of the bridge. Remus released his hand just as they heard the porter yell after them; they looked at each other in panic and then ran through seemingly endless hallways until they found an outside door. They emerged into a wide, paved courtyard; the only way out seemed to be through a shut wooden gate. With Remus leading, they ran to the gate just as a startled woman swung open a smaller door within it. Getting out required a leap over a foot-high piece of wood whilst avoiding the woman; Remus did this easily but Sirius, whose brain was flaring and fizzling like a pixie in a cage, smashed a shin into the wood, tripped out the door, and knocked into the woman. Remus grabbed him by the arm, yelling, ‘Sorry!’ and then, with Sirius limping badly, they darted around the corner and ran as fast as Sirius could back to Merton Lane. Chests heaving, they breached the magical barrier into St Cyprian’s and staggered across the quad and up the staircase to Remus’s room.

‘I,’ Sirius started to say as soon as the door was shut, though he didn’t have anywhere to go from there except to I think I love you, and where had that even come from? Remus, gorgeous, damp, sensible Remus, shook his head, still gasping, and tapped his watch. Sirius squinted at it. Five to six; he was supposed to be meeting James and Peter. He looked helplessly at Remus, who shoved him out the door and in the direction of the washroom, where he’d left his wet clothes from the night before and his toothbrush. By the time he’d returned, Remus was sitting on the bed, holding his bookbag, a determined look on his face. It made Sirius light-headed.

‘I’ve decided,’ Remus said, lips pursed, ‘that I’ll go with you.’

When they got to Herts’, not having spoken of anything beyond travel details since they left Remus’s room, they found a note from James addressed to them both.

‘Cocky bastards,’ Remus muttered when he saw it.

Sirius read aloud, ‘”Peter and I are going to come down tomorrow morning. Detained by some business. You can have the Red Room and the Green Room”.’

Sirius read the letter silently again, noting that James had assigned them bedrooms adjoined by a washroom. The house has fifteen bedrooms in three separate wings, and this is what James gives us? He thought. There was a distinct bubble of panic in the vicinity of his chest. The problem wasn’t that he had kissed Remus; it was that he wanted to kiss him again.

‘I rather suspect,’ Remus said, leaning over Sirius’s shoulder, his breath warm on his neck, ‘that “business” is code for “Lily Evans”.’

‘Me too,’ Sirius agreed. ‘Though where the hell Peter is, I have no idea.’

‘I think they were travelling together,’ Remus said with a shrug. He put his hand onto Sirius’s shoulder and Sirius shivered involuntarily. Remus turned him, gently, until they were facing each other.

‘You’ve been touching me all day,’ Sirius blurted, heart pounding, and Remus smiled.

‘I’ve been touching you for years,’ he said. ‘It’s not my fault that you haven’t noticed.’ He paused and ran his hand down Sirius’s arm to take his hand. ‘Well, maybe it is my fault. Maybe I’ve been too subtle.’

Remus’s hand on his felt was warm and comfortingly strong. He squeezed Remus’s fingers. ‘Then I’ve been a fool,’ he said, voice low, and leaned in for a kiss, but Remus let go of his hand and darted back.

‘Whatever will the house elves say,’ he gasped, faux-scandalised. ‘Now, I have a lot of reading to do for my tutorial on Monday. I’m going to my room.’

Sirius couldn’t help but follow Remus, gawking, trying to reassess years of friendship with the way that the lines of Remus’s back captivated him as he followed him through the dark wood-panelled hallways and up a curving stone staircase to the tower wing that James had assigned them. Remus pushed open the door to the Green Room, set his bag on a chair, and peeled off his cloak. Sirius stood just in the doorway, watching him, still trying to think and mostly failing. Remus wore a thick cable-knit jumper; Sirius wanted to bury his face in Remus’s chest and just breathe in the smell of him through the damp wool. Remus pulled a book from his bag and smiled.

‘Sirius?’ he asked. ‘What are you doing?’

‘I guess,’ Sirius said, utterly bewildered, nervous, playing with the thick silver clasp on his cloak, ‘I’ll go to my room.’

‘Oh,’ Remus said. ‘I was thinking…’

‘What?’

Remus laughed. ‘Have you ever read a manor house mystery?’

Somehow, Sirius’s bewilderment increased tenfold. ‘No…’

‘You know, like Agatha Christie, that kind of thing? Big house, murder, all the guests are trapped by a storm, the butler did it?’

‘Sort of like that Muggle game?’ Sirius hazarded. ‘Cluedo?’

‘Exactly.’

Sirius squinted at him. ‘Go on?’

‘Doesn’t this house remind you of one?’ Remus asked, sitting down on the four-poster bed. It had a lush-looking dark red comforter that Remus pulled his feet up onto. ‘You know, big house? Squeaky floors? Rain on windows? Tree branches scraping?’ Remus hesitated and Sirius shook his head. ‘All alone in my bed?’

Sirius laughed, startled, and felt something inside of him uncoil. He stopped playing with the clasp on his cloak and undid it, setting it over Remus’s and climbing onto the bed. ‘For years?’ he asked, still a little incredulous. ‘Really?’

‘Yes,’ Remus said, and kissed him, hard enough to push him down into the folds of the comforter. Sirius grabbed the edges of it partly to have something to hold on to and pulled it up around them, cocooning them in.

‘Were you going to tell me ever?’ he asked, exasperated and fond and aching somewhere deep in his chest.

‘Just come out and say it?’ Remus asked, words muffled as they passed between their mouths. ‘Where’s the fun in that?’

‘We, oh,’ Sirius slid his hands under the jumper and ran them up the strong warm lines of Remus’s back, ‘we could have been doing this years ago.’

‘That would have been a terrible idea,’ Remus said reasonably. ‘Trapped in a small room with Peter and James? And Hogwarts isn’t particularly romantic anyway, is it? I’d much rather here and now.’ They were now facing each other on their sides, breathing heavily, mouths and noses touching, limbs entwined, hands roaming and undoing. ‘I’ll be honest,’ Remus added, unbuttoning Sirius’s trousers, and all the while, Sirius was saying incoherent things like, ‘London, Oxford, I don’t care, we’ll Floo, we’ll make it work,’ and casting away Remus’s jumper somewhere into the dark beyond of the bedroom, and Remus continued, ‘I rather liked watching you piece it all together,’ and then Remus’s hand moved down further and Sirius stopped babbling. Remus kissed him, long and hard and Sirius thought a little bit searching, and he answered to the best of his abilities, and Remus drew back, just for a second, out of breath, to say, ‘It had to be here, Sirius. It’s finally right.’

Oxford is the most dangerous place to which a young man can be sent.

-          Anthony Trollope

---

[1] Victoria and Albert Museum, South Kensington, London

[2] Flat-bottomed boats most commonly seen on the Cherwell in Oxford and the Cam in Cambridge. They look like this.

[3] Library card necessary to enter the Bodleian Library, the University’s main library

[4] Which in later years would become famous as a location for filming a popular series of Muggle films about wizards.

[5] They’re past the part where (SPOILERS for a lovely mystery novel set in Oxford that everyone should read!) Harriet and Peter are on the river and Harriet realises that she is in love with Peter, implying of course that Remus has already read it.

[6] High Table being the place at the top of a hall, often slightly elevated, that faces out over the other diners and where fellows (professors and lecturers) of the college and their guests sit.

[7] And this is what that bridge looks like on a snowy day.

[8] People, usually quite imposing, whose job is to guard the entrance to a college (usually from a small room in the entryway known as a ‘lodge’) and answer any inquiries.

Comments

[brighty18.livejournal.com]

Wow! I feel like I just got a full tour of Oxford - and that is absolutely awesome. Including the footnotes and links and stuff made it a fabulous adventure as well as a fabulous story. And that felt like an extra special treat.

The use of quotations, too, was clever and inspired.

But the story, itself, was lovely. From beginning to end it was well-written (and prettily written) and enjoyable.

***applauds***

[erised-rain.livejournal.com]

Well, I want to go to Oxford now. Beautiful descriptions, you made it so real and alive. The dialogue between the boys is so captivating, I died a bit when they kissed - Sirius leaned into him, breathing him in. Wow. Just wonderful, I love this story, great job! (:

[laroseminuit.livejournal.com]

I suddenly really miss summer and college, and it has nothing to do with the 20 inches of snow outside, and everything to do with the romance of the halcyon days you've described here.

Oh, Sirius, though, I can't believe it took him that long. I mean, punting? With wine and berries and mystery novels? Remus might as well have hit you over the head with a brick.

[mindabbles.livejournal.com]

*happy sigh* This was wonderful. I really enjoyed it. The descriptions and the details were just fabulous. Like brighty said, this was a treat. And the romantic sop in my is very happy.

[huldrejenta.livejournal.com]

How I'd like to go to Oxford now, preferably with Remus and Sirius :-)

This was all so beautiful and vivid. Lovely details, lovely language! Oblivious Sirius is super adorable, and I love the way they get together.
Now I'm all warm and happy:D

[fullmoon-dreams.livejournal.com]

Wow, I just adore the detail in this story. You have really brought Oxford to life in this.

I like the subtle Remus, letting Sirius figure things out slowly. And the comment about sharing a room with Peter and James was just too funny, since so many of us do enjoy cramping them together in that dorm. I love that you took a different route to the norm.

[woldy]

*happy sigh* This is lovely, and a really original take on their lives after Hogwarts. I like how you've drawn out the class themes in the Marauders, with the remark about Sirius giving up the Black fortune and Remus as the scholarship boy - something he'd be very aware of at Oxford, surrounded by all that privilege. I liked imagining them in the library together and the parallels with their life at Hogwarts, sneaking about amidst all that honey-colored stone being shushed, and Remus' essay assignment specifying the number of inches (although 8 inches seems very short for a tute essay). I really enjoyed it!

[(Anonymous)]

Ah, Brideshead. Perfect!

“But I was in search of love in those days, and I went full of curiosity and the faint, unrecognized apprehension that here, at last, I should find that low door in the wall, which others, I knew, had found before me, which opened on an enclosed and enchanted garden, which was somewhere, not overlooked by any window, in the heart of that grey city.”

[westernredcedar.livejournal.com]

This is simply gorgeous, so understated and peaceful, like a perfect day of memory. I loved all the details of this world, the magical colleges and the essay writing and the focus on class and status. Brilliant.

[escribo.livejournal.com]

This is absolute perfection. I'm not sure I can say more than that, mostly because I want to go reread my favorite bits. I truly enjoyed this so very, very much. I wish it went on for forever.

[chiralove.livejournal.com]

OH MY GOD THIS IS AMAZING!!!!!!!!!!!111111!!!!eleventy!

First off, I am SO sorry that this is such a belated read, I've been sick all month and not had the energy to do anything - but I SHOULD have made the energy for this somehow, because it is absolutely delightful! SO much love for this story, you have NO idea!

I love the way you've painted Oxford here - it's practically as though it's a character in the story, and all the quotes and the scenery and the descriptions are AMAZING. I love the punting scene! Trust Sirius to wind up in a black tie party dripping wet! And the details of colleges and libraries and museums and -oh, everything. Everything is just so so so perfect. That is my favourite Evelyn Waugh quote, you know (did you know? How did you know that?! amazing!)

And, Remus and Sirius are so perfect together. I love Sirius's slow realization, and I love Remus watching him figure it out, and the two of them are just SO sweet together. Love the visit to the V&A as Remus's dying wish, and Sirius putting up with it, and then pining after him, and the two of them with their social problems understanding each other, and Sirius still saying that people are okay.

It is all just so so so perfect, and I can't believe how amazing it is, and I am so incoherent with it right now, but you are a genius. An absolute genius. SO much love. <3

[musesfool.livejournal.com]

This is lovely!

[veeagainst.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much! I lived in Oxford for many years and love the place dearly, so it was easy for me to write about it.

[veeagainst.livejournal.com]

Thank you!!

[veeagainst.livejournal.com]

Indeed, Sirius was a bit thick wasn't he? And there's nothing more idyllic than summer at Oxford.

[veeagainst.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

[veeagainst.livejournal.com]

Thank you!!

[veeagainst.livejournal.com]

Haha, it's true, we do love putting them into that room with the other two and it just seems so difficult and improbable, especially when you consider the standard size of beds at school! Glad you liked it!

[veeagainst.livejournal.com]

Thank you! The class themes are very important to me whenever I consider their story, because I think they would have been quite aware of them themselves -- and going to a place like Oxford would have exacerbated that greatly. You're probably right about the length of the tute essay, btw, but I have no conception for how many words can be fit onto a scroll of parchment... good catch :).

[veeagainst.livejournal.com]

The prompt I responded to specifically mentioned Brideshead, which is a novel that has great personal meaning for me, so I can't take credit for thinking of it :). Thank you!

[veeagainst.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much!

[veeagainst.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much!!

[veeagainst.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

[veeagainst.livejournal.com]

No worries at all on the belated read, I actually dashed off on holiday for two weeks and haven't had a chance to reply to your comment until now! I'm so glad that you liked it!! I hope you are feeling better as well.

I did not know that was your favourite Waugh quote but I'm glad to hear it! I love Brideshead as well. I think no one describes Oxford quite so well as he does there -- and lots of people have tried! I also love Gaudy Night by Dorothy Sayers, which inspired me quite a bit here too, so if you haven't read that, I would recommend it.

Really thank you for the comment, I've got a huge grin on my face because of it. Happy post-holidays!!

[woldy]

Ah, I am old enough to remember the days of hand-writing history essays, and they were long. I'd estimate 4 to 6 A4 single-sided pages, which are around 11.7 inches long, so if we remove the margins I'll guestimate it as 36 to 54 inches total writing. Not that I take an excessive interest in these things, or anything. *whistles innocently*

[veeagainst.livejournal.com]

Ah, yes, I have only ever typed essays (and not in history). Good to know though, anything for accuracy :).

[penhaligonblue.livejournal.com]

Wow! Hitting the books in Duke Humfrey's, punting on Cherwell, High Table, Dorothy Sayers... even a first kiss on the Bridge of Sighs! This ticks all the boxes, doesn't it? :)

I've had this open in my browser for weeks (the title caught my eye - love that line!), and I finally just got round to reading it. Your love of the city is quite palpable, and the boys' romantic escapades added fuel to my Oxford nostalgia. (Honey-colored stone and low-hanging willows, oh yes! Essay deadlines and bossy porters, not so much.)

I was shocked by Remus's suggestion that Sirius just stroll through Magdalen without permission, but then I remembered that they're Gryffindors - and Sirius certainly regretted it soon enough! Like others, I loved the moment of recognition by the purebred schoolmates: Sirius handled it well. And this bit was adorable:

‘You’ve been touching me all day,’ Sirius blurted, heart pounding, and Remus smiled.

‘I’ve been touching you for years,’ he said....

Nicely done!

[veeagainst.livejournal.com]

Thank you, I'm glad you enjoyed it! It's easy to be nostalgic about a place as beautiful as Oxford, and I've found that, as time passes, I remember less and less about essay crises and more about the way that it always felt a little bit like a fairy tale to be there.