mother fuck, while doing research for my james potter essay for @annabtg, I came across THIS quote:
Madam Rosmerta: āOf all the people to go over to the Dark Side, Sirius Black was the last Iād have thought ā¦ I mean, I remember him when he was a boy at Hogwarts. If youād told me what he was going to become, Iād have said youād had too much mead.ā
Sirius Black was, even to someone who barely knew him, SUCH a deeply good person that he was the last person you'd have thought would become a death eater. THE LAST PERSON. Not the loyal, Gryffindor-bred James Potter, not quiet Prefect Remus Lupin, SIRIUS FUCKING BLACK, the firstborn son of a blood supremacist family with several family members who actively served Voldemort.
Young Sirius Black was so full of goodness that if someone said he was going to be a death eater, Rosmerta would have thought they must be drunk.
And Remus and McGonagall and Dumbledore and everyone else who knew him so much better let him go to Azkaban without a trial, never tried to get him out, never gave this boy the benefit of the doubt.
And then what did he do when he broke himself out of Azkaban? He forgave Remus in an instant. He rejoined the Order. He trusted Dumbledore enough to willingly stay locked up again. He handed his house over to be used for the Order, welcomed people to come and go as they pleased, to stay long-term if they needed -- even Snape, who had recently been eager to have him killed. And in a matter of two years, showed Harry more parental love and support than anyone had before -- to the point of dying for him, exactly as his parents did.
So when you actually look at canon Sirius, I think it's very clear why he was the last person you'd expect.
Sirius didn't abandon Harry to take revenge on Peter. He arrives at the scene when hagrid already has Harry in his arms and won't let him go no matter how often Sirius asks, and dueling hagrid over Harry would be a really bad idea for all the reasons. Hagrid takes Harry to dumbledore and only then does Sirius go to look for Peter. And even that wasn't necessarily for revenge, Peter could have been in danger or dead for all he knew. But he finds Peter, and that man who was supposed to be his and James' best friend, murders 13 people in front of Sirius' eyes, and frames him for the deaths of all of them, plus himself, plus the potters.
Even his breakout from azkaban isn't fueled by revenge. It's because a mass murderer hangs around Harry on a daily basis, and that's... Yk. Dangerous.
Also even without a spy in their ranks Remus was in the most vulnerable position so making him secret keeper would just put him and the potters in more danger, and telling anyone about the secret switch would defeat the purpose of a secret switch.
Sirius did nothing wrong, and I won't even count trusting the wrong person. It's not his fault that Peter switched sides.
The only thing that may have been a bit out of pocket was trying to kill Peter before the eyes of three children, but we don't really know what his plan would have been after getting all of them to the shack, and it's Remus who actually instigates this as soon as he arrives.
Look I do love Sirius with an art hobby but it is a little weird that every modern AU has him study visual arts ect instead of engineering like he was destined to do!!!!
I don't understand what about Sirius makes you think he would be in love with someone who is constantly mean to him lmaooo yes that man has some serious issues but he is not someone who lets people walk over him.
Fluffy prompt- how would wolfstar propose to eachother?
hmmmmm okay okay
big ole disclaimer before we begin: i got a similar ask a few weeks ago that iāve been ruminating over for so long bc i have my own biases and opinions about marriage that arenāt always positive. so i tried to work around that with this because 1. i donāt want to write something negative and cynical when someone sends a prompt thatās meant to be sweet and heartwarming, and 2. marriage can be beautiful and wonderful and it means a lot to people that do value it. so likeā¦.,thatās where iām coming from and my cynicism might come through in this a bit even though iāve tried to look at it from a better, less biased perspective. it turned out pretty long and kind of all over the place, but i hope that it hit somewhere close to where you wanted it š«¶š«¶š«¶
so part of me thinks theyād either get engaged & married after three months of dating or likeā¦..ten years. no in between. but in this case letās make it easier on ourselves so we donāt have to get into lots of plot and say theyāve been together-together forā¦ā¦three years. like properly real-relationship-in-love-living-together kind of together for three years.
obviously their histories and past experiences play a part in both their relationship and their desire to get married, so i think theyād be coming at it from different places and do a lot of existential late-night working through how their views and hang-ups are different and how theyāre the same and how they can make it work for them
remus grew up with parents that loved each other in a reserved wayāthey got married young and had to work through a lot together, like raising a kid and financial struggles and points of tension within their families over the years. but there was never any doubt that they loved each other and they always treated each other with this kindness and gentleness and care that remus admired. so he has this view of marriage thatās like ālife is hard but weāre in it together, weāre a team and weāll get through anything that might come up.ā thereās some lingering fear that maybe heās not enough to be someone that anyone wants to spend the rest of their life with, especially sirius, but their relationship is good and stable and healthy and they genuinely enjoy each otherās company beneath all of it. they love each other and they have a good foundation, and to him it feels like the right next step for them to take together
but sirius did not grow up with that kind of stability at home, he did not have that practical, positive view of marriage because his entire family tree was riddled with arranged marriages and affairs and and resentment for spouses. his parents were indifferent towards each other at best and spiteful at worst, they barely interacted except to fight with each other or with him, and it was clear very early on that heād be expected to marry some second cousin and have kids and carry on the bloodline. so he grew up with this fear of what marriage was going to mean for himāsomething based on convenience and not love, that heād be trapped with someone he resentedāand it wasnāt until heād left and had time to process and start to heal from all of it that he even considered the idea that he could marry whoever he wanted, now.
so heās in this great relationship and he loves remus, and remus loves him, and itās more than he ever thought he would be allowed to have. and sometime after their first anniversary theyāre at home and remus is like āwould you ever want to get married?ā and sirius is like āā¦ā¦šļøššļø would i WHAT??::?:?ā and remus is like āno no wait iām not proposing sirius iām just asking.ā and itās a task get it out of him, but eventually sirius tells remus all about what getting married means to him, how he learned to be afraid of it early on and still struggles to see it as something good. and internally remus is kind of like āoh,ā because heād really love to marry sirius and have a life together that goes beyond sirius just being his boyfriend. and somewhere deep down heās worried that this means sirius doesnāt want to fully commit to him, that he loves sirius more than sirius loves him and theyāre not on the same page as far as the whole āi want to spend my life with youā thing goes, but sirius shuts that down fast.
they end that first conversation in a better place, where remus trusts that siriusā aversion to marriage comes from his past and not anything to do with their relationship, and sirius believes remus when he says that he understands and that heās content with the way things are
so over the next year they keep on as usual, things are still good and theyāre still obsessively into each other and sickeningly in love. but sirius has been thinking about it in the back of his mind for a long time, and remus is nice and doesnāt pressure him to talk about it but sirius has got this idea in his head that getting married means security. it means that remus wonāt leave him, that theyāll be together forever, and that sounds more like what he wants. and the more he thinks about it the more he starts to get panicky that remus will leave if they donāt get married, because he obviously wants to, so he brings it up again.
theyāre at home on a random saturday morning and theyāve just finished breakfast and remus is reading at the table and having his third coffee of the day and sirius goes āwhat do you think about getting married?ā and remus looks up and goes āš¶ā¦.what do you mean?ā because they havenāt really talked about this in a few months but he knows that sirius knows he would like to get married eventually, and sirius is acting nonchalant about it but remus knows something is off. so heās like āwhereās this coming from?ā and sirius is all casual and shrugs and says ānowhere i was just wondering.ā and again it takes a lot of work but remus finally gets him to crack and tell him what heās been thinking, that heās afraid remus isnāt satisfied or that heās going to leave if they donāt get married. and thatās what it is, he realizesāsomewhere in the time since they last talked about it, sirius has started to see marriage as the only way to keep him around long-term, as the thing that will prevent them from breaking up, and as much as he wants to say ālove it letās do itā and marry sirius, itās not going to work if heās seeing it as the only way to make sure remus wonāt leave him.
so they have a Big Talk, and remus tells him the truthāthat heās in this thing for the long haul whether they get married or not and that he doesnāt need to get married to be happy together. it takes a lot of reassurance, but eventually sirius starts to come to terms with the idea that getting married doesn't have to do with the longevity of their relationship, or this idea of an extra layer of security. over the next few months they keep it on the back burner, bring it up every once in a while and work through any hang-ups theyāre having or things that maybe still donāt make sense. and eventually remus learns to trust that sirius doesnāt want to marry him just to prevent him from leaving, and sirius comes around to the idea of it being another step forward in their relationshipāa big one, but one that means they love each other, and theyāre committed to each other in more ways than just ānot breaking up.ā
so over the next couple of months remus plans, and despite what sirius said about wanting something big, he has a better idea.
itās just a normal thursday night and sirius is coming home, heās a little tired but itās takeout night and heās really craving the moroccan place down the street. he unlocks the door and kicks off his shoes and stops in his tracks because the living room light is off but there are candles lit, and there are rose petals on the floor like a corny hallmark movie and the love of his entire life is at the kitchen table, standing when sirius shuffles into the room all silent and wide-eyed, and remus goes āi know you said you wanted something big, but i thought this was better.ā and sirius loves loves loves him, loves him so much he canāt breathe because heās rightāsirius had been all talk, all he really needed and wanted was remus and the little box heās holding, and it feels right that this is happening in their home, the place that had seen every boring weeknight and slow morning after nights out, every fight and apology and hard conversation in between, all their laughter and joy and the disgusting amount of love that existed between them.
but then heās like āWAITā and runs out of the room and leaves remus on the ground and remus is all āā¦ā¦..helloā and then sirius is running back with his own little box, throwing himself back to the floor and grabbing remusā left hand and pushing a thin gold ring onto his finger, and remus is ab to cry his fucking eyes out bc sirius is smiling so big and holding their left hands up next to each other. and then he looks closer and thereās a tiny little outline of a crescent moon on the side of his ring and then he is crying, like full on snot and tears crying, and then theyāre both crying and having very weepy and disgustingly sappy sex on the floor
and after, remus orders from the moroccan place down the street and sirius calls everyone they know and screams into the phone about the power of everlasting love and that they want a new toaster as a wedding gift
which is how they end up with fourteen toasters six months later
please please can we get a post of remus calling sirius baby for the first time bc im obsessed and want to know every detail about siriusā outfit and how it went down
YES YES YES š¹š¹š¹š¹š¹š¹š¹š¹š¹
Remus was too drunk for this.
Wellāmaybe drunk was the wrong word. His blood alcohol level was probably still somewhere in the realm of tipsy, but his brain was sluggish. Slow-moving. A disastrous combination of desire and want and pure, unadulterated filth. His limbs felt heavy and too-long as he stood slouched against the wall, gripping an empty glass hard enough to be absently worried it would shatter in his hand. Watching.Ā
Lily had described the place as a bar but it felt more like a club, all low, colorful lights and blaring music, an open space in the middle of the room and tall tables lining the walls. It was loud, Remus was just on the drunk side of tipsy, and Sirius was a fucking dream.Ā
All things considered, Remus had done a really great job of being normal up until an hour or so ago. He hadnāt lost his shit when Sirius appeared at his door in a giant gray coat with his hair up, tied messily off his neck, fully flaunting the faint bruise Remus had left below his ear two days before. That damn glitter was on his eyes again, catching the light and working in tandem with the faint smudgy black lining his lashes to make his eyes look less gray and more glowing, molten silver. Remus had nearly fallen to his knees, had nearly said 'fuck it' and yanked Sirius inside instead of following through with the going out plan, but heād been very regular about itājust choked out a simple little āyou look nice,ā swallowing hard when Sirius smiled sweetly and took his hand as they traipsed down the stairs and out of the building.Ā
Then theyād arrived at the bar, and Sirius had slipped his coat off, and Remusā poor, piece of shit brain had immediately broken.Ā
So now here he was, fighting for his life standing around a table in the corner, unable to wrench his eyes away from the three-inch strip of bare skin on Siriusā stomach while he waited for drinks at the bar. He was wearing a short, black tee shirt with an open back over some see-through, lacy thing that hugged his waist, showing off the tail end of the dagger tattoo on his stomach and the beginnings of the vines on his hips before they disappeared beneath straight-legged black pants that fit so perfectly Remus could have cried. He was leaned up against the bar artfully, tapping the toe of his platform boot against the floor, chatting idly with Marlene while they waited for the bartender.Ā
Remus thought he might be drooling.
Sirius had been flitting between the bar and the dance floor and their table in the corner all night, leaving Remus with a never-ending supply of drinks and all these evil, lingering touches, whispers near his ear disguised as kisses on his cheek that twisted his gut and made his fingers itch to touch and grab and hold. This thing between them was still new, only a couple weeks old, and Remus was really really trying to reign himself in, but god, he wanted to touch. Wanted to bite and lick and taste, felt drunk on desire more than liquor by the time Sirius came back with two more neon-colored drinks in sweaty glasses.Ā
āYours,ā he chirped over the music, finally, finally sliding in close and depositing Remusā drink on the sticky tabletop. Remus eyed him as he sipped at his straw, looking up at him with wide, innocent eyes. It was blatantly obvious that Sirius knew exactly what he was doing, and that it was working. Remus glanced around, watched Marlene saunter off to join Dorcas across the room, and slipped a hand around Siriusā waist, backing himself into the wall and pulling Sirius with him.
āYou lookā¦ā he started, shamelessly trailing his eyes down and then back up Siriusā frame, shaking his head with a sigh when every word he could think of fell short of the actual ethereal being currently pressed up against him.Ā
āI look what?ā Sirius prodded, sliding his drink onto the table without looking, snaking his arms up Remusā chest and around his shoulders, a smug, sly sort of smile tugging at his stained, cherry-red lips.Ā
Remus was too fucking drunk for this.
He managed to get a hand to Siriusā jaw, tipping his head back just enough to brush their lips together, reveling in the hitched breath it pulled from his throat.Ā
āYou look fucking perfect,ā he muttered, letting Sirius lean in only to pull back. Remusā vision was swirling, heart thundering in his chest when Sirius gave a quiet little whine of complaint, dragging blunt nails across the back of his neck. Remus gave in, let him press a too-short, too-soft kiss to his lips before tilting Siriusā head to the side, mouthing down his jaw to get at that faint little bruise beneath his ear and nipping at it softly, eyes fluttering closed at the taste of his skin, speaking before he could think. āYouāre killing me over here, baby.ā
Fuckāhis stomach dropped instantly. Heād never said that before, never used any kind of pet name for Sirius at all, and it felt foreign in his mouth, foreign to his ears, settled badly in his stomach when Sirius let out a sharp exhale and reeled back. Remus was prepared to pretend it had never happened, maybe blame it on those neon colored drinks that kept appearing in his handsābut the words died on his tongue.Ā
Siriusā eyes were wide, flicking back and forth fast between his own, cheeks flushed a pretty pink. Remus waited, watched Sirius look down at his lips and then back up, and barely heard him breathe, āSay it again,ā over the music.
He hesitated, studied Siriusā face carefully to make sure he wasnāt reading it all wrong, and teased, āYouāre killing me over here?ā
Sirius shook his head, a hint of a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. āThe other thing.ā
āWhat?ā Remus asked, dragging a thumb down his jaw, the desire to sink through the floor disappearing into thin air as he watched Siriusā pupils dilate, felt his fingers trip up to tug at his hair. āBaby?ā
Sirius nodded, pulling him in close and speaking low. āYeah,ā he smiled, āthat one.ā
Remus kissed him, had to, pulled him in with two hands on the side of his neck and bit at his lower lip, tasted artificial cherry and vodka and felt his stomach drop when Sirius gave a sweet little whine, pulling back just enough to speak.
āAgain,ā he whispered, melting further into Remusā chest, looking up at him with that smug little grin that made his heart stutter.Ā
āBaby,ā Remus repeated, kissing him again, fingers curling into the hair at the nape of his neck, brain working overdrive, whirring loud in his ears. āMy perfect, pretty baby.ā
Sirius let loose a string of colorful curses that made Remus laugh before he was pulled in again. Sirius was seemingly entirely finished with teasingākissed him hard and bit at his lip and slid his hands heavily back down his chest. He pulled away after several long moments, a deep flush staining his cheeks, and gave Remus a look.
āDonāt drink anymore,ā he ordered, a secret sort of smile playing at the corner of his mouth. Remusā skin tingled, heat racing down his spine.
āNo?ā he smirked, instantly grabbing for Siriusā hand to keep him close when he stepped back.Ā
āNo.ā He reached across the table and grabbed an abandoned water on the other sideāJamesā, most likelyāsipping at it instead of the bright red drink heād just brought over. "We should go to yours after this."
The only reason fandom is so obsessed with Remus nowadays is because y'all just gave him all of Sirius's traits. Oh, he's broad-shouldered and tall and has thick thighs and he's a daddy and a top and a dom and an athlete and buff and soooooo handsome and a Casanova who has slept with half the school and also he's into women??? Babe you just described Sirius from the early 2000s š
iām seething with tired frustration when stumbling upon fics centered around parental remus thatās more involved in harryās wellbeing and life in general juxtaposed against an angsty, almost cartoonishly childish sirius, whilst canon events are piping fresh in my mind. i was listening to the poa audiobook recently, and do you know how jarring it was to hear remus chastising harryās behaviour?
people bring up the point that remus had zero obligation towards harry: heās a child, not a friend; remus is chronically ill and cash-strapped; itād be bizarre for a grown man to get to know harry by introducing himself as their dead parentsā friend. well, by the same token, it isnāt as bizarreāor frankly alarmingāthat a grown adult should scold an orphan for throwing away their sacrifices while insinuating a close relationship to them?
the first time harry has an inkling his professor and parents might have been fast friends is when remus hits him with a biting āgambling their sacrifice by wandering the castle unprotected with a killer on the loose seems to me a poor way to repay themā when remus was shamelessly keeping siriusā secret to himself at the risk of harryās safety all along. it seems laughably manipulative and self-serving of a man whose friends spent years learning how to transform into animagi to assist him and keep him company during his lowest moments to not repay their kindness towards their orphan son.
yes, remus is a marginalized member of society, but is he an impoverished muggle victorian wasting away from a dickensian disease unable to procure funds for a horse, too sickly and plagued with mobility issues for a long journey?? he has a wand and apparition license, and he probably couldāve picked up a directory to search for the dursleyās residence if he so wished to check in on harry in secret. travel costs nothing for him. he doesnāt suffer from chronic mobility issues three weeks out of a month (being generous here as post-transformation aches are nasty). he didnāt have to see him in person. he couldāve just lurked in the shadows, maybe even dropped an anonymous tip to wizarding or muggle social services after taking a small peek into harryās life, troubled over the signs of maltreatment and neglect.
or fine, so he couldnāt accomplish such feats during the first twelve years because his guilt is an infinite abyss deeper than the marinara trench and other unforeseen circumstances. what was stopping remus from slowly getting closer to harry and finding an opportunity to gently break the news he was once close to james and lily when he began his teaching stint? it might have somewhat softened the blow of his words, then. maybe.
honestly, the nerve of a stranger (because again, remus is nobody to harry at that point) to just come up to an orphan and tell him heās figuratively dancing a jig and spitting on his parentsā graves. you are his teacher, you do not get to tell him off as if youāre a family friend when youāve been purposefully distant with their son.
remus has nothing on sirius when it concerns parenting or being a responsible adult figure. sirius was on the lam, unable to live in human form, risking capture and surviving on bloody rats just to stay closer to harry. sirius suffered twelve years with soul-sucking monsters who feasted on every last good memory and shred of joy, and sent their victim spiralling into depths of despair from their most horrible experiencesāand we can infer his childhood was ghastlyāyet somehow remusā monthly furry problem excuses everything under the sun. but not sirius.
sirius who is battling pstd and depression, and putting on a brave smile for strangers who insult him under his own roof and treat him as an unstable and easily combustible person. sirius who is reliving every hellish childhood memory in that mausoleum of a house and trying to protect harry by keeping his godson informed and injecting some levity into their miserable lives, gets painted as an impetuous overgrown teenager unfit to be harryās guardian. but not remus.
grrrr.
please donāt strip sirius of his core characteristics and turn him into a caricature of his canon self while propping up or whitewashing remus. heās not the tall and irresistible brainiac of a casanova fanon has redefined him as. remus is canonically greying, looking like heās one good hex away from meeting his maker, perpetually exhausted, and possesses a generous heaping of cowardice. heās not the cleverest among the marauders because heās scholar-coded. one can enjoy books and reign supreme in a specific field of interest without ranking top of the class. disillusion yourselves; he did not tutor james and sirius because their marks were inferior to his. instead, the duo sailed through their classes without much effort.
to be clear, this isnāt me lambasting remus to make sirius look good. this is a stand against fanon remus (and enforcing the truth of canon remus) because his fanon portrayal has permeated almost every other fic and is being bandied around as the essence of canon remus. and frankly, itās absolutely cheesed me off to the point of disliking remus entirely. if you want to project your desires and fantasies onto remus or fetishize him, please just include self-insert or original character in the tags.
(not everyone but enough of the fandom, and its the reason i started writing fic in the first place!!!!)
and im just going to jump over likeā¦physical descriptions and the stupid height discord and say one of the things people get most wrong that truly drives me insane is that somehow sirius ends up being the one making all these likeā¦inneundos (in your end-o, see what i did there?) and coming in hot with the sexual jokes and humor and like the waggling eyebrows. And hes there just being like a complete baffoon??? In the worst ways? Like clueless and there for a punchline with very little substance.
Even in wolfstar stories!!! Where hes supposed to have substance!! Hes there just being a bumbling fool for no reason. Or else just like FLYING OFF THE HANDLE randomly. okay.
When I say that the Wolfstar fandom hates Sirius, itās because I see shit likeĀ āSirius at his worst doesnāt deserve to be loved by Remusā circulating on my dash š Love isnāt a one-way street, babes! If Sirius loves Remus at his worst, Remus needs to love Sirius at his worst. And no, Remus at his worst isnāt him being a werewolf, itās him believing Sirius could ever betray James. And also leaving him in prison for twelve years without so much as a note.Ā
Why do you all afford Remus grace and forgiveness for his crimes but donāt extend the same to Sirius (and his non-crimes)?
on the commodification of fanfic in the marauders fandom.
so i thinkā¦i think itās okay to not like things. to go so far as to say you hate something is a little much, though we use that word so freely these days that itās lost that extreme connotation. but to not like something is part of being human, thatās part of living; to see the world and learn from your choices and keep pursuing what you enjoy.
however, in a fandom space where people come to rid themselves of stress, to connect with likeminded people and to just have shameless fun?? thatās not the place to hate openly.
the people here that make the fics you read do not do it for you. they do it for themselves, for numerous reasons. its a hobby, much like any other hobby only that it also involves a level of interaction that is bigger than we realize, i think. no one here is getting paid to do this, no one here is by any means a professional or seeks out criticism to become one (well maybe some are i donāt know, i am certainly not).
so when you come and give unsolicited negative opinions on things, when you demand more ācontentā from people that create for themselves, you are doing the very thing that goes against what anyone pursuing any other hobby would say not to do. you are the reason that people shut themselves out and donāt want to do this anymore. itās not funny nor is it helping anyone.
and maybe one could argue that āthe rise of tiktokā has commodified everything, people feel comfortable enough now to openly hate on ācreatorsā, these young teens donāt know how to act in fandom spaces, blah blah blah. sure. that could be a reason for all of this but that does not excuse anyoneās behavior. people should not have to be making post after post about this kind of thing. just be fucking nice on main.
you can hate. itās okay, itās fundamental in our genetic makeup or whatever. i hate, i hate everything (especially pickles.) but do it privately. make a friend and do it in the dms. come on. itās like rule #1.
and maybe if you hate marauders fics so much you shouldnāt be here. just a thought :)
where are the remus lupin time-loop au where he has to relive october 31, 1981 and each loop he keeps trying to save james and lily only to find out heās suppose to save sirius black
