Seasons…

for Sirius

In the spring on weekends, I wake up early when the sunlight streams through drawn curtains. I roll out of bed on all fours to pad the fall, then I duck outside the cabin, the door shutting with a click but not locked. I collect a handful of fresh flowers from the forest floor, or from the meadow, and set them on the table in a vase to be admired before the morning coffee. I fill the vase from the tap, ducking my face beneath to taste the running water with my tongue like an animal. You’re always groggy when you wake, and while my bathrobe is light and shredded, yours is fluffy and warm and meant for a colder season. You have but the one, and go without in the summer. You settle down in your chair and reach for the coffee, but first and always admiring the flowers. Sometimes they tickle your nose, and it twitches in a funny way. Sometimes the scent gets you going, and it’s all I can do to whisk the vase and mugs off the table before you pin me to it, face down, and take me.

With breakfast comes the morning Owl, Enyd, our sleek and kind barn owl. An owl from the Daily Prophet comes as well, brining the subscription. Sometimes they two are accompanied by Hedwig, and news from Harry, which is opened before all else and read eagerly as the breakfast gets cold. Enyd and Hedwig prune each other, as the other flies off, and they coo and doze, nibbling at the food left in the serving bowls. Breakfast is always somewhat of a celebration, a thank you for letting me get through the night. Some are rougher than others when the full moon beckons. And we take great joy in the first feast of the day, making everything ordinary from a clink of a fork against the china to seconds of fresh berries feel wonderfully magical.

As soon as breakfast is over, we prepare for lunch, making sandwiches and snacks and packing it all up into a picnic basket. It’s the same basket given to me by Lilly and James when we were all in school together. It was in my possession all through the dark times, when we didn’t dare to leave the house on something so joyous as a picnic. It was in my possession when you were wrongly in prison. It was in my possession when you returned to my arms and we resumed what should always have been with nuzzles and growls and much love. The blanket is spread over a small, secluded spot of the Hogwarts castle roof, and we sit upon it nibbling more than the food, and necking for desert as the warm rays of the spring sun fall down upon us.

We spend the afternoon lounging on the roof, looking out over the fields on one side as the tournament nears its end for the school year. We root for our old house, Gryffindor of course, but are always taken in by the action on the field. Sometimes we sit on the other side of the roof, looking down on the lake. If we look very closely, we can sometimes catch a fin of a merperson sticking up through the water. Sometimes there are lads fishing there, or skipping stones on the waters. It makes us feel young again to watch the future, but nothing you could ever say or do beside of me could make me feel old. Even as we watched Harry go through school, save us all, get bonded with Ron, get a job at the ministry, and publish… even as so many things happen around us, we are still young when we are together. We are still young in the newness of a warm spring afternoon.

We remain as long as to see the first star of the evening, and wish upon it. We’ve never spoken of our wishes, but I would hazard a guess that since I only wish for a select few things over and over again, that your wishes are not much different. Especially since one of my wishes is you. Always you.

Sometimes it rains, and we huddle together in a small bubble I create with a swish of my wand, protecting us from the elements. Other times, we’re forced off the roof and go wandering about the castle on our own, exploring the new additions and the constantly-changing rooms. As rain pours down outside the windows, we cuddle, a little chilled, in the corner of the game room, over a game of chess. Or we take tea in my office and engage in a spell war. I always win, but I think sometimes you let me do so.

Dinner in the great hall is never awkward, and though certain things are never talked about, the avoidance is never a cause of tension among the professors. In fact, they are always willing to engage in stimulating conversation on a wide range of topics. Severus, perhaps, is a little reluctant to converse at times, but our relationship with him has improved since his heroic actions which spared Harry’s life, among others so many years back during the second rising.

Dessert is sometimes with Dumbledore, who still as a sweet tooth, and still has an interest in Harry’s adventures. Sometimes we have ice cream at Hagrid’s Hut, which is the closest dwelling to our cabin anyway. It makes for a beautiful walk home, arm in arm, gazing up and the stars and admiring the lightning bugs as they fly from tree to tree, lighting them up like Christmas decorations. Sometimes, out of the corner of our eyes, we can catch the nymphs retreating to the woods after a long, magical day of helping the flowers grow and the grasses green. Everything is dull at night, but the stars and moon shine our way home.

~ * ~ * ~

Summer is as it always has been- hot and lazy. School is out, so I have no more classes. There is nothing at all to do but to be with you. We go on day trips, weekend trips, sometimes week and month-long trips, to all the places we wanted to visit when we were young and could spend the summers only daydreaming. Sometimes we take a quick dip in the lake; the water is an enchanted chilly even on the hottest summer days. Sometimes we strip down to nothing but shorts and lie on the fields beneath the sun. We roll, warm skin sticking as it becomes hot and sweaty. We kiss most passionately, grass tickling our ears as we tickle each other’s tongues. When we are alone, we wrap the blanket around our bodies and make love in the open. Hot, sweet love that leaves us gasping for one more delicious breath of it.

We sip lemonade and eat watermelon. I steal a bite from yours, and you steal one from mine. But with yours comes a mouthful of seeds and you growl, sweet juice running from the corner of your grin. Even you, with your canine wiles, are too dignified and gentlemanly to spit seeds out, preferring to eat around them instead. So you go to swallow but before you do so, I utter a spell to relieve you of the inconvenience. I lick your face clean, lingering on your smiling lips the longest. Then I tickle your stomach and joke that I wouldn’t want anything growing in there. You joke back that if I don’t let you eat more of my share, what will grow there is hunger. I pretend to hide my section of melon behind my back and you pounce upon me in growls and laughter, nibbling my neck, my ear, my shoulder, eating me until I hand it over. And once I do, you never take it to eat yourself. Instead you feed it to me, bite by bite, as I lie on my back and take in the summer sun.

We watch the birds fly around our heads. And at dusk, we watch the owls fly in two lines from the Owlry. Full of energy from their vacation as well, they swoop and shriek, playing with each other as they scout around to catch their own dinners, a treat as they are not allowed such freedoms of the grounds when there are students busily about.

By the end of the day, we are both so hot that a shower is mandatory before we can even think of heating a kitchen to make dinner. And of course, we shower together to save time, as we really are both hungry. We laugh as I move to soap your arms and you squat down to do my legs. Then I go to wash your back and you’re already moving to do mine. I scrub your hair, working the suds through your long black hair, your ponytail undone so that the hair falls over your shoulders. And I slide my soapy hands over your rear, slick and smooth. I cannot resist holding you close enough to take you in the shower as the water washes that clean as well.

Dinner is something filling but simple, as we both cannot wait to take each other in bed. We shovel food into our mouths, remarking as to how good it is, then shuffle the dishes towards the sick and set it to work washing itself. We once thought of getting a house elf, but Hermione, who visits whenever she can and is always a welcome partner for all sorts of subjects from philosophy to muggle news, would perhaps strangle us with her feminine hands. And we would miss the absolute privacy that comes from having our own cabin all to ourselves. I would have to look every time I wanted to surprise you by jumping onto your back and hugging you from behind. And you would have to look every time you wanted to pounce out from behind the corner and nuzzle me to the floor in arousing pleasure.

~ * ~ * ~

Classes resume in the fall, and I worry a week before time if my lesson plans are up to date and good enough. You stay up late the first week and help me learn the names of my new students. You rub my shoulders and tell me I’m a wonderful professor. And though I never fully believe you, I still need to hear every word every time. You’re invited with me to the welcome banquet, and I notice the twinkle that lights your eyes every time another student is sorted to our table. You’re the one that welcomes them with hugs and pats on the back, and I with handshakes and smiles. I can still remember my first night at Hogwarts, how alone and scared I had been. How you sat beside me and made conversation, how you began our friendship and broke through my fear. I’d been there a week earlier with my parents to make arrangements with Dumbledore as to my situation. And after that I’d nearly given up hope of a normal life with real friends. No one in their right mind befriends a werewolf. No one, that is, except a dog. And with you, came the others, the four of us so tight in friendship. The best years of our lives, we’d called it. But we did not know of how happy you and I would be now. Happier than ever before to be family.

Sometimes, when I come home from my office after a day of classes, you are not there to greet me with a pie in the oven or a spell to practice. I must search you out over the grounds until I find you raking leaves. I know you sense me near, but I still take you by surprise when I pull you with me, laughing, into the pile of raked leaves. We roll amidst them, the fresh autumn scent making us both randy and ferocious, the crisp air filling our lungs and our loins. I throw a handful of leaves at you, you dump an armful over my head like rain.

Sometimes we dine in the banquet hall, sometimes alone in our cabin, unable to let go of so much free time alone together as we had in the summer. After dinner you read me poetry or work on an article for the Hogwarts parents newsletter. And I lie in your arms and wave my wand as shapes dance on the ceiling, forming into my lessons for the next day. We sit and plan our private Halloween celebration, inviting Harry and Ron to the cabin to feast on an early dinner.

When we grow weary, we retreat to bed, washing up separately, then crawling under the covers to snuggle as the night air grows colder. Your nose is cold and wet, and your feet like ice when you move in close. And though anyone else would pull back startled and uncomfortable I never do. Instead I move closer to you, touching you, stroking you, rubbing you up and down to warm you under the light blankets.

~ * ~ * ~

Winter comes, bringing feet of snow and a quiet calm to the land. We wake at the normal hour, then stay in bed extra long, snuggling in warmth we don’t want to leave. I don’t care to trade your secure embrace for the coldness of the morning air. I take the bathroom first on mornings when I have classes, and you in your warm, puffy bathrobe put hot water on the stove for my tea and your coffee.

Before Christmas, we speak much about what presents shall go to whom and how this and that will be celebrated. And we always seem to reflect when we are most happy like this, upon who we miss the most and who we wish we could celebrate with. Sometimes I come home and surprise you with an early present, which is sometimes an actual thing and which is other times just a playful romp with our candy-canes.

When it snows, you can never resist a snowball fight. No matter how many we’ve had over the years, you never lose that boyish gleam in your eyes when you see the perfect opportunity to hit me with a ball of snow. Sometimes you do it when I’m out with students, demonstrating for class. You get the whole class throwing snowballs at you from behind a makeshift fortress of snow, and most times you still come out victorious. Other times, you do it when we’re alone together. You’ll surprise me by smacking a snowball right into my side. And I’ll have absolutely no choice but to laugh, dip a hand down, and throw one right back at you. We play until we’re rolling in the snow together, making angels which are then destroyed by our giddiness. The winter holds pent-up energy which must be expressed somehow.

Soaking, we’ll go inside together, and I’ll strip you down before I undress myself, with no thought of sex in mind. I wrap a warm blanket around your shoulders and send you to the couch with a cup of hot chocolate and the fattest non-melting marshmallows I could find in the kitchen. Then I take off my soaking clothes as well and join you under the blankets on the couch. We cuddle with each other for warmth, sharing the same blanket, the same drink, the same sniffles as our noses run from the cold. You start us a fire and I close my eyes, the warmth flickering on my face and soothing me in perfection.

Sometimes at night you’ll turn into a dog and play with me, licking my face and other parts in goofy adoration, nuzzling me with your cold wet nose, tickling me with your flapping ears, sometimes even scratching me with your paws. I stroke you, laughing, chuckling, hugging you against me and digging cold hands into your warm black fur. When we bed, you’re still dog-like, even in your natural form, wildly going at me, biting and snarling so much you make me shriek and moan.

Exhausted, we collapse together under heavy layers of blankets, folded up with one another. I spoon you and you spoon me, arms and legs entangled warmly as the freezing winds sound around our cabin and shake the boards.

~ * ~ * ~

Spring returns as always, breaking through the cold of winter. It brings rebirth and warmth. It brings to the lands what we preserved strong in our home throughout the year. It is said that spring is the time for lust and lovers. But with you by my side, and in my heart as always, the seasons are never the definer of our passions. Our love is ever-changing with the seasons, but it is still the same, powerful love.