Across the Hall

Don't You Dare Take my Spotlight

June

Their graduation was quite the event, with caps thrown in the air, streamers decorating the stage, and celebrations all around campus. The entire graduating class had been seated on chairs spanning across a huge, impossibly green field, with the stage in front of them decorated in UCLA's colors. The atmosphere was filled with emotional smiles and eyes filled with happy tears as all the classmates shared this once in a lifetime experience together. Immediately after the ceremony, Remus had looked up to see Sirius already running across the field to him, throwing himself in the taller boy's arms, robes billowing around them as laughter rang out in the air. Remus had spun them both around like some cliche romance movie, as Lily and James arrived to include themselves in the hug as well.

They had started making their way to the bleachers, where parents had begun coming down from to congratulate their children, and Sirius was struck with the realization that he would be meeting the Hope Lupin.

He and Remus had been dating for a year already, and throughout that time, Sirius discovered that one of his favorite things was to listen to Remus talk about his mother. Even though he had never even met her, Hope Lupin quickly became one of Sirius' most adored people.

~

Only a month prior to this, the two boys were comfortably laying in Sirius' dorm bed, legs tangled together as they held each other impossibly close.

"Tell me something about your mom." Sirius said softly, the air from his breath puffing onto Remus' collarbone. He felt Remus laugh quietly, causing him to slightly jostled from his spot on Remus's chest as a hand wove through his black hair. "I don't see what's funny." Sirius pouted, though Remus could not see from the way his face was shoved into the boy's neck.

"Love, I've told you practically everything about my mom." Remus laughed into his hair. "I don't even think there's anything you don't know."

"There must be!" Sirius looked up to meet Remus' amber eyes, with a challenging gaze. "Tell me a memory you have, with just you and her." He stared at Remus, eyebrows narrowed.

And the other boys face softened once again, his laughter dying but a small smile still playing on his lips. He leaned forward to place a soft kiss onto Sirius' lips, causing Sirius' face to alight in a smile, which earned him another kiss, before relenting. "Okay okay, uh- oh, I know! There was one day back when I was maybe about... eleven I think..."

And Sirius just listened and listened to countless memories that Remus held in his heart, and Remus never grew tired of seeing the soft look on Sirius' face, his lips lifting in a small smile, eyes filling with something Remus couldn't quite identify. He marveled at the way Sirius would never grow tired of hearing him talk about his childhood, and he had begun to grow worried. He worried that maybe the boy really was secretly annoyed of Remus and he way he was always telling his own stories, and was just kind enough to keep asking to hear them, but in that moment as he watched Sirius, he realized something.

In that moment, with Remus recounting another fond memory of him in the garden with his mother many years ago, he watched Sirius face. Sirius had propped his chin up on Remus' chest, listening intently, but his eyes seemed distant and he wasn't quite looking at Remus. His gaze had wandered to something insignificant on the nightstand, but Remus knew that it meant the boy had zoned out. His heart clenched, but he felt a warmth in himself that he only ever felt around Sirius.