Whatever frustration had been building deflated immediately, Sirius’ words startling enough to wipe the slate clean. Remus’ expression wavered, a flicker of something youthful and afraid, the black pit of the war seeming to grow even deeper in that moment.
“Are you serious,” he said, a shaky incredibility. It wasn’t even a question, familiar enough with Sirius’ anger to know he wasn’t joking around.
Shifting forward, Remus reached over to push the other chair at the table away from it, a rough invitation for Sirius to stop fidgeting and take a seat, desperate to see this conversation to an end.
“He’s an infant,” Remus repeated.

While Sirius easily saw the offer from Remus for him to sit down he feared that allowing his body even that amount of rest would make him fall asleep immediately. Instead, he stayed standing and smoking his cigarette impatiently, wondering what more they could possibly have to talk about.
“It’s mostly speculation, I honestly can’t remember what it said exactly,” he stated, running a hand through his hair, which was already a mess, and feeling so absolutely dejected and hopeless. “But people are taking it seriously enough that we found it best to hide them away. Rumours o the grapevine is that You Know Who is taking it very seriously.”

_________________

Sirius’ rejection was small and insignificant, and yet it made Remus’ frustration reignite, feeling cast aside by Sirius’ nonchalance. It once again made his jaw clench, feeling the urge to yell at Sirius for it, but he knew that wasn’t the issue; everything else was.
“So what, they’re just gone until -” Remus started, but the sentence lost its punch when he couldn’t get the ending out. It felt like such terrible, helpless odds to think they’d all survive this, that James and Lily would ever have an opportunity to come out of hiding - or that Remus would even be there to receive them.
“When was this?”

There was something devastating in seeing Remus trying to make sense of everything that had been going on since he had left, but it was as if the feeling never really took hold within him, instead passing through him briefly as an echo of something he had felt a long time ago.
“A couple of days ago,” he said, the dates blurring together for him to a point where he wasn’t actually sure when James and Lily had left the safe house, but he knew that it had at least been a couple of days.
Once his cigarette was smoked down to the filter Sirius pulled out his pack once more, figuring that as long as he kept standing and smoking he would be able to keep having a conversation.
“It was very sudden and we had to work fast.”

_________________

When Remus had asked the question he had had no expectations as to what the correct answer would be, but it soon became clear that this wasn’t it. It was once again Sirius’ nonchalance that stabbed him between the ribs and the desperation and panic of knowing Remus must have only just missed it, and the absolute devastation of what that would entail.
“It couldn’t have waited a few days? I haven’t seen them in months and now -” Remus felt nauseous at the thought, his anger momentarily giving way to something young and scared. It was so ****ing different knowing anybody could die at any time, it was a different thing entirely knowing for sure you had seen someone for the last time.
Anger soon settled back onto Remus’ expression, a much easier emotion to process. “You knew I was coming back.”

Something within Sirius snapped at Remus’ question, utterly unable to comprehend how Remus could be so blind to the reality of their situation.
Obviously, they couldn’t just have waited a couple of days to move James, Lily and Harry, otherwise they might have found a better way to do it, not when their lives were at stake the way that they were.
Furthermore, if You Know Who caught wind of which safe house they were kept in, there really would be no telling what kind of consequences that would have for the rest of them.
“Well tough,” he stated, feeling so raw and emotional that he was amazed that he managed to still be standing. “Sorry we didn’t prioritise you seeing them when their lives were in danger, but I guess that we should have just taken that chance, yeah?”

_________________

Remus looked like he’d been slapped. Over the course of their friendship, Remus had not been a
stranger to the feeling of being just on the outskirts of Sirius’ and James’ friendship, but never had it struck him this much in the face.
“That’s not what I said,” he staggered, still visibly shaken at the accusation.
Bitterness soon took its place, blooming somewhere deep in his chest with roots that spanned not only days but months, if not years. Remus was tired and malnourished and suddenly overcome with an almost childish sense of things being unfair, of Sirius not caring about Remus’ life as much as he cared about James’.
“You’re so ****ing holy, Sirius,” Remus bit, fuel to the fire. “It’s so easy for you to do the right thing when it also just happens to serve you. You got to say goodbye, because you’ve been with them this whole ****ing time.”

Sirius felt like he was about to explode, so desperate to get some sleep but also knowing that he needed Remus to understand. He really didn’t want to have this conversation, still reeling from the threat of having his best friend taken away in such a palpable manner.
“Do you really think that this serves me?” He bit, feeling torn and jagged already, and having Remus react to it in this way just felt like someone pressing salt into his already open wound.
“Yes, obviously I got to say goodbye to them, but that doesn’t make this easier to stomach.”

_________________

Remus’ eyes momentarily widened, as though Sirius had almost said it and still missed the point by a mile, too daft to understand that what it served him was an opportunity to belittle Remus for asking for equal treatment.
“Yeah, and I didn’t even get that, so go ****ing figure how I feel,” Remus all but barked, a laugh punched out of him.
Remus stared at Sirius for a moment, before scoffing again, finally turning away from Sirius.
“Whatever,” he ended up dismissing. He was so utterly exhausted by the ever-present competition in Sirius’ voice, like they weren’t living through the same war.
Pushing the chair back with a scrape as he stood up, poorly restrained frustration.
“Send them my regards,” he said bitterly.

Despite how absolutely bone tired Sirius was, he knew that he couldn’t let them end their evening on this note. Remus really was the only thing that Sirius had left to hang onto, but he wasn’t willing to be made out to be a liar or like he had it a lot better than Remus, because he had just gone through some of the toughest goodbyes of his life.
“Not like I am in a position to send them to them,” was what he settled on, feeling tired and exhausted by the entire thing.

_________________

Remus once again felt the sting of rejection, of being kept at an arm's length of people he thought were his friends, too. The time spent at the camps had brought out a temperament in Remus he knew he hadn’t had before. It buzzed just beneath the surface, something mean and violent, the bite of wild dogs, and Remus had to make a conscious effort into reminding himself that Sirius wasn’t that.
“Right,” Remus strained, the tension in his voice making him sound like he was about to laugh, finding everything so stupid. “I know they have a secret keeper, so whether or not you would, you could.”

Exhaustion was making every bone in Sirius’ body feel so heavy that he almost felt like crying, his head spinning from trying to keep his conversation with Remus straight, but he honestly had no idea where to even start.
Obviously, Sirius would have been the obvious choice for James and Lily’s secret keeper, which was the exact reason why he had told them not to make him one. However, he couldn’t grasp that thought long enough to form it into a proper sentence, much less convey the idea to Remus.
“Right,” Sirius spat, feeling more and more on edge the longer he was being kept in this conversation. “You better bring your regards to their secret keeper then, because that’s not me.”

_________________

The tension drawing ever-tighter, Remus’ eyes finally snapped back onto Sirius. “I’m not stupid, Sirius, you’ve been saying we this whole ****ing time. I know it’s you.”
Remus didn’t even think it possible that Sirius would give up that responsibility. Their entire conversation had made it abundantly clear how Sirius’ relationship with James had become full of greed and possessiveness, though maybe it had always been like that. With how the conversation had unfolded, Remus couldn’t imagine Sirius had found anybody else worthy of safeguarding James’ life.