{ words are futile devices } | james&sirius
dogstarsirivs:
potter-prodigy:
He can’t help the chuckle that leaves him, even though it’s bitter and winded. Can’t help the way it makes his chest feel like it’s cracked and dry from the merciless glare of a desert sun, peeling him away layer by layer, leaving him raw and bare boned.
But he chuckles, because Sirius has a way of making it so, no matter how he feels, and when the long-limbed bastard lops his way over to him in that easy stride, the rest of the world falls away and James’ feels his resistance buckle. His strength, like stones balanced on brittle autumn leaves, shivers like it might burst into nothing more than dust and smoke and memory.
But he doesn’t want to break down in front of his best friend. He knows that despite his immaturity and his uncertainty and his cowardly heart break, somewhere under all that shite is a man, and so help him Merlin, he’s going to be one, for fuck’s sake.
But Sirius’ hand on his shoulder is warm and heavy and reassuring and James finds himself leaning into it, and then leaning into Sirius. Eye contact lingering, saying more than he ever could with words because, for some reason, they simply aren’t coming to him today, he steps in, closes the distance between them and pulls Sirius into a tight hug. Arms linked around his next, James buries his face in his friend’s neck and inhales him—like a pathetic and scared child, and he’s almost ashamed but doesn’t have the energy to care.
“Well who’s fault is that, you bastard,” he mutters into his skin, eyes shut tight against the idea of reality and of anything other than the way Sirius’ touch makes him feel grounded. “You keep fucking off, going Merlin knows where. Where the hell have you been, anyway?”
James is there - just there - and Sirius wants to wrap his arms around him, keep him close, keep him safe, but James beats him to it. Arms are around him, and Sirius can’t help but press himself closer, closer; his own anxieties
Arms are around him before he can move to do the same, and his body reacts, conditioned to reciprocate because it is James. Sirius can remember when touch did not come so easily to him, when he had been several heads shorter, fresh-faced and bright-eyed at Hogwarts, the world at his fingertips. He remembers shying away, lungs squeezing the air from within at the thought of touch. Before James, it was associated with fear, punishment. But this is what James had taught him, touch and affection and care, one never without the other; love in its simplest, easiest form - a kiss on the cheek and arms flung round another, playful punches and shared beds when night became too much. Touch is easy, now, and Sirius craves it.
His arms wrap around James, keeping him close, safe, and he can’t help but press himself closer, closer; for his own sake or James’, he doesn’t know. It doesn’t matter, because James is with him, a part of him, and the world, at large, melts away as easily as snow on a sunny spring’s day. All he can feel are the sun’s rays - bright and comforting around his heart. James is warm against him, his breath familiar or something on his neck, and Sirius smiles, head resting atop the mess of black hair, eyes falling shut.
“Busy,” he answers. The word tumbles too easily from his mouth. It should have caught in his throat, like a fly in a spider’s web, thick as it is with implication and evasion. Busy, yes, but it is only a half-truth that Sirius can never reveal; the thought is a sharp drop in the pit of his stomach. But he is unable - unwilling - to focus on his deceit with James held close. “You know how it is. Least I’ve been gettin’ out. That’s more ‘an you can say, mate.”
Things are a lot more complicated than they used to be.
It’s funny, how things change. In the blink of an eye, everything is different, and nothing is like it was at Hogwarts, when they were just fuck-up kids with their shoelaces untied and dirt scuffed on their knees. Suddenly, everything is dark and dangerous and a looming, leering threat, and knowing your friend is lying to you doesn’t mean the same thing it used to.
It used to be something you could call someone out for, as though you’ve never had to do the same. It used to be something that didn’t carry the same weight it does not. Weight that feels like shadows lurking over your shoulders, and taste like char on your tongue.
It used to be, that if Sirius were lying to him, James could smack him upside the head and tell him to be out with it.
Now, though, when Sirius lies to him, James still knows. He still knows, like he knows the back of his hand, because he’s always been able to navigate Sirius, to read him. He knows, but what he can do, and how he can feel about it, is different. Because with everything going on, if Sirius is lying to him, it means there’s a reason, and it likely has something to do with death. Or an attempt to avoid it.
There’s a messed up idea of what ‘protection’ is, when there’s a war going on.
James’ throat is tight, and the smell of Sirius behind eyes shut tight makes him want to tear up and break down. He attempts to hold it together, letting out a half-breath laugh at Padfoot’s tease. “Trust me, mate, I reckon I’ve been doing everyone a favor, staying in. Don’t want me moping and mad, wandering the streets of London or stumbling into Honeydukes. Really.”
He turns away, scratching the back of his neck and trying to recover his grip on a sense of non-chalance. With a breath out chapped lips, which he licks as he turns back around, and he hopes his tone and expression are ones that belong to someone easy going, and much less of a wreck than the current James Potter. He gives Sirius a weak grin and the lift of dark brows. “So, uh, tell me, what are people saying about me out there? That I’ve gone mad? Turned into a raging alcoholic? I hope there’s good stories with it, at least. Done something good for my dazzling reputation with the ladies,” he drawls.
Desperation to appear fine. To be fine. He reeks of it.
