Title: The Crutch

Rating: NC-17

Pairing: Harry/Remus (brief mention of Harry/Dean and Harry/OMC)

Summary: After the death of Voldemort in Harry’s final year at Hogwarts, Harry is still in danger from a few remaining Death Eaters who are out for vengeance. Those in the Order wanted to keep Harry safely locked away, but he had other plans and disappeared off to the Muggle World. Now, it’s time for Remus to persuade Harry to return.

Warnings: Accents ;-) Drug use.

Excessive amount of Author Notes: Local Britishisms I’ve used that you may not be familiar with are ‘Old Bill’ (the police) and ‘banged up in the nick’ (sent to prison).

This was written for my beloved friend, Sue, who sent me lots of Lupin pictures when I was hunting for one in particular. This is my way of saying thanks.

I was asked for: “Harry/Remus, featuring top!Harry, post-Hogwarts, on holiday somewhere.  Must include mention of sheep and Lupin's cardigan. Exhibitionism is optional.” Leather, butt plugs and vibrating toys are three things I’ve also included, and these have been taken from a list of kinks that I pestered Sue to give me.

Many thanks to Lee for the beta.

Disclaimer: The following story is classified as fan fiction. It is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

 

**

 

Chatham

 

It was a Friday when I finally made contact with Harry. 

 

I had been tailing him for several days—taking over from where Nymphadora Tonks, and then Kingsley Shacklebolt, had failed.  At that point in time, Harry had been gone for three weeks, and we knew he wasn’t safe.  He couldn’t be, not with so many of Voldemort’s supporters still at large—all of whom were very keen to avenge their leader’s death.  But the problem was that Harry didn’t want to be found.  You’d catch a glimpse of him, and then he’d notice you and Disapparate before you even got close. 

 

I had caught sight of him a couple of times over the past few days in a grimy town called Chatham, where some of the stronger accents seemed almost incomprehensible to me.  Each time, Harry had managed to elude me, and now I had caught up with him again, I was determined not to let him get away.

 

I watched as he ducked down an alleyway along with someone in a baseball cap.  The alley looked dank and dark—even though it was only midday—and the grubby building that the alley cut through loomed menacingly overhead.  Some unseemly character was hanging around the entrance to the alley, and it certainly didn’t seem to be the first choice of locale for any of the Muggles who were wandering past me where I stood.  But as I said before, I was determined not to let Harry get away this time.  Burying my hands in my pockets, I strode forwards.

 

There was graffiti haphazardly plastered across the walls and rubbish that had been there far too long strewn across the floor.  It smelt like a urinal, and I had to watch my step to avoid the mess on the floor that I really hoped was the product of someone’s dog and not what I thought it was.  Then out of the shadows ahead, I could discern movement.  Two people were walking in my direction.

 

“Harry?” I called out uncertainly.

 

“’Oo tha fu’ er you?” a gruff, male voice replied. 

 

I could make out the outline of their large—too large—bodies by now, and it was evident that neither one of them was Harry.

 

“I said, cun’, ‘oo tha fu’ er you?”  They moved closer, and I started to panic as I had only the vaguest of ideas about what was being said to me.  I had managed to get the gist of it from the tone of voice, though: I wasn’t welcome there, at all.  “Wot tha fu’ er you doin’ da’n ‘ere?”

 

“I’m looking for a friend: Harry,” I quickly explained, a bizarre hope springing up inside of me that they were acquaintances of Harry’s of some…description.  “He came down this way a little while ago.”

 

“No ‘arry’s bin da’n ‘ere.  I fink yer talkin’ shit, mate.”

 

At the same time that my hope had been quashed, my attention was drawn towards a glint of light: one of them had pulled out a knife.  I started to back up, my hand diving towards my inside pocket where my wand lay.  But before I reached the comforting piece of wood, a thick arm wrapped around me, pinning my wrist to my chest.

 

“I don’ fink so,” a third voice growled in my ear.

 

And then I was whipped round, shoved hard against the wall; I could see that this third person was the unseemly character who had been loitering about by the entrance.  He rummaged through my coat, took out my wand and laughed. 

 

“An’ ‘ere I woz, finkin’ you ‘ad sumfin’ scary in tha’ jackit o’ yours.” 

 

My wand was dropped, the clatter of wood against stone echoing loudly in my ears.  An elbow connected sharply to the base of my skull, sending me sprawling downwards to join my wand.  I reached for it, only to have a booted foot tread heavily on my hand.  Another boot kicked me in the stomach.  Something else hit me on the head.

 

The alleyway faded completely.

 

**

 

Finding Harry

 

When I regained consciousness, it felt like the morning after a full moon, with my body throbbing, and here and there a particular sore spot.  A sharp pain flared up across my forehead and I flinched.

 

“Hold still.”  The voice was stern, but familiar.  I opened my eyes and tried to focus on the dark-haired young man in front of me.  It was Harry.  “I said ‘hold still’.  Gavin is going to flip as it is when he sees you.  If you get blood on the sheets, he’ll blow a gasket.”

 

I didn’t have the strength to question what I was doing there, and I didn’t think it would go down too well if I pointed out that Harry’s bedside manner was just as appalling as Sirius’s had been.  So I did as I was told and kept as still as I could while Harry mopped up my injuries. 

 

We were in a campervan.  The wallpaper was peeling away from the walls in places and going mouldy in the corners; clothes, paper, empty food wrappers littered the floor; there were cupboards with doors that appeared to be clinging on for dear life; a long bench stuck out from the wall next to a table, which was also covered with an assortment of things just like the floor was; beyond the table was a gas hob and a sink, out of which dirty plates and mugs spilled onto the adjacent work surface.

 

I was laid out on a bed, shirt undone, feeling awkward that Harry was taking care of me like this, but also grateful that he had somehow rescued me from that damn alleyway.  In Harry’s hand was a piece of towelling, stained red from my blood, which he futilely tried to rinse off in a bowl of murky-red water that rested on a small, bedside cabinet.  As he continued to attend to my injuries, I studied him, wondering what he had been doing over the past three weeks.  

 

The last time I had spoken to him was at Grimmauld Place, when I had popped in to make sure he was doing okay.  He made it clear how things were going when he bitterly asked me, “How would you feel if were told you had to be locked up here for the rest of the summer?”

 

I couldn’t blame him for being so angry.  After successfully despatching Voldemort, he was being treated like a child once more, cooped up in the same way that Sirius had been, wanting to get away from it all, but not allowed to unless accompanied by an entourage of wizards.  An entourage that wouldn’t include his best friend, Ron. 

 

Ron—who wasn’t at risk to the same extent that Harry was—had a holiday of his own coming up, with Hermione.  After which, Hermione and Ron would be spending their time finding a flat together in Devon.  And on top of this, Harry had the knowledge that he alone—out of all those seventh year students who had survived the war—had to retake his final year at school.  What with one disturbance after the other over the past year, Harry had managed to fail every single N.E.W.T. that he had taken—even Defence Against the Dark Arts, owing to having missed the final exam. 

 

While all his friends were enthusiastically making plans for the times ahead, Harry’s immediate future had already been decided for him.  It wasn’t surprising that he had come apart at the seams, disappearing from the Wizarding World out of desperation.

 

Now, he seemed a lot more relaxed in the way he held himself, but it was evident that he was irritated by my presence.

 

“What were you thinking, going down that alley?” Harry asked harshly as he leant forward to tape a square piece of gauze to the side of my stomach. 

 

“I was following you,” I replied, realising as I spoke that my mouth was parched, so much so that the bowl next to me looked a tempting option with which to quench my thirst.  “Can I have some water?”

 

Harry stood and walked over to the sink.  “I should’ve known better than to hope you’d all give up trying to find me,” he said as he rinsed out one of half a dozen mugs that were waiting to be washed up.  He filled the mug from the tap and then hunted around in the cupboards for a moment before producing a straw.  “You can drink through this.  I don’t want you moving until your head has stopped bleeding.”

 

I sipped at the water as greedily as I could through the tiny straw, wondering why Harry hadn’t just used magic to heal my cuts—as they only seemed to be surface wounds—or magic to clear up the blood. 

 

“Have you lost your wand?” I asked.  “A simple charm could clean up any mess.”

 

Harry shook his head and with a harsh laugh, he said, “The only cleaning charm I know doesn’t get blood stains out of fabric.”  He took the mug from me and placed it next to the bowl.  “I was a bit busy at school last year—learning defensive spells and the like—to have time for that sort of thing.” 

 

“Or healing charms?”

 

“Yeah.  Sorry.”  Harry leaned forward to tug gently at the edges of the gauze on my stomach.  “This one seems to have stopped.”  Then he looked at me in realisation and said, “I suppose this was all a wasted effort, really, now that you’ve come round.”  He stood and took a wand from a drawer in the bedside cabinet.  My wand.  “They didn’t snap it.  I guess you can do a better job of sorting out your injuries.”

 

He handed my wand over, and with the help of a mirror, I was able to seal the edges of my head wound.  I then tidied up the gash on my stomach before casting a cleaning charm on all the bloodied items.  Harry had relaxed ten-fold by the time I was finished.

 

“Your cardigan’s outside,” he said.  Then he motioned in the direction of a chair, over the back of which my jacket was hanging.  “You landed in something nasty.  I cleaned the jacket, but I didn’t want to risk Scourgifying the cardigan in case it fell apart.  I know you’ve had it for years.”

 

I smiled gratefully and glanced around the campervan again, acknowledging its tatty appearance for a second time.

 

“Harry, what are you doing here?”

 

“I’m on holiday.  I said I needed one, so I’m having one.”

 

“But you’re still in danger.  There are still—”

 

“Yes, I know.  But you can’t expect me to go back and live in that…that bloody house for the rest of the summer.  I won’t be a prisoner there like Sirius was.”

 

“What about…Hogwarts?”  It had been a sensitive subject before Harry had disappeared, and I was hoping that Harry had had time to calm down about it now.  “You are going to repeat the year?”

 

“Yeah,” he said sourly, kicking at an abandoned sock with his foot.  “I’ll be on the train come September first.”

 

The door banged open, making me jump, and I nearly dropped the mug of water.  The same man I had seen accompanying Harry down the alley stormed in, still wearing the baseball cap, and also, a face full of annoyance.

 

“Where tha bloody ‘ell did you disappear off to, ‘arry?” He asked, and then he stared at me for a moment before continuing.  “An’ wot the ‘ell you picked up this time?  I told you, I don’ wan’ any trouble.”

 

“It’s okay: he’s a friend.  He followed us going down to Alan’s, and a couple of Alan’s mates gave him some hassle.  So I went to help out.”

 

“You ‘ave no fu’in’ idea jus’ ‘ow suspicious Alan was af’er you ducked ou’.  ‘e thought we were up to sommat dodgy, tipping off the cops or the like.  Took me bloody ages to swee’ talk ‘im roun’—we nearly didn’ get any…stuff fer the weekend.”  He stopped talking and looked at me for a second time.  “’Ere, ‘arry, ‘e ain’t got nuffin’ to do with the Old Bill ‘as ‘e?”

 

Harry shook his head.  “He’s just here to persuade me to leave, but I’m not about to.”

 

“Harry—” I started to say, but Harry abruptly cut me off.

 

“The only way you’ll get me to go back is by force: knock me out, tie me up or something.  And I know you, Remus; you won’t do that.” 

 

He was right, of course: there was no way in the world I could ever force him to go back to Grimmauld Place.  I had a hunch that that would probably be the worst thing I could do for Harry’s sanity. 

 

“Even if you did,” Harry continued, “I’d only leave again.  I don’t care that there are…people out there with a grudge against me.  As far as I’m concerned, that’s something that might never change.  So what should I do?  Stay locked away for the rest of my life?”

 

“Jus’ remember, ‘arry,” Gavin butted in.  “You don’ bring any trouble ‘ere tha’ I ‘ave to deal wiv’.  Tha’s tha deal, righ’?”  Without waiting for an answer, he walked back to the door, adding, “We’re ready to go in ten.  If ‘e’s comin’ wiv’ us, ‘e’ll ‘ave to stay in your campervan.”

 

“Look, Remus,” Harry said once the door had closed, “as Gavin said, in ten minutes we’re going to be leaving, so I’ve got stuff to sort out before I can drive this van.  Otherwise, my things will be in a bigger mess than they already are.”

 

I shook my head, not quite sure I had heard him right.  “You can drive?”

 

“Sort of.  Well, enough to get by.  Gavin has been teaching me.  He’s all right really; he’s just a bit tense today, what with…one thing and another.”  Harry shoved a pile of dirty clothes into a drawer and wedged it shut.  “Remus, I’m in one piece and I’ll be back to re-take my final year.  Tell them to stop chasing after me.  I’m getting bored of trying to avoid people who only want to get me back in that…prison.  Let me have this holiday.  I need this.”

 

“But you’re still not safe.  These people you’re with, do they know that you’re a wizard, that those who are after you are also wizards?”  Harry shook his head warily.  “If you’re surrounded by Muggles, it makes you a far easier target—”

 

“I’m not going back.  How many times do I have to tell you?”  He stacked a pile of dirty dishes into a cupboard and paused before closing it.  “If you’re that worried about it, tag along.  As Gavin said, you can sleep in here—I’ll take the floor—and you can play bodyguard.”  I gaped at him, slightly surprised by his suggestion.  “Stay and keep an eye on me or go.  I don’t care.  Just don’t expect me to go back with you, because it won’t happen.”

 

It was clear that I didn’t really have any choice in the matter, not if I wanted to make sure that Harry was as safe as possible.  The only problem I could foresee was the full moon, which was two weeks away, and even then, I could probably persuade Tonks to take over from me for a couple of days.  I only hoped that this arrangement would be enough to stave off any trouble.

 

**

 

Maidstone

 

We drove in convoy, with one campervan and two caravans.  Harry wasn’t overtly communicative on the way, but he explained that we were going to a club on the outskirts of Maidstone.  Two of the others—Stuart and Neil, who owned one of the caravans—were DJs, and so Harry had tagged along with them as they drove from club to club.  The campervan we were in belonged to Gavin’s brother, Ben.  The only reason Harry had been allowed to use it was because Ben had been “banged up in the nick for a few months”, as Harry had put it, and Harry was now paying Gavin rent for it.  When I tried to get more details out of him about Ben, Harry just clammed up.  With Harry refusing to talk any further about what he had been up to, I spent the rest of the journey watching the Kent countryside roll by with its excessive amount of sheep, wondering whether there were actually more sheep in existence in the Muggle world than Muggles.

 

We parked in a grubby field that had various items of junk deposited across it, and Harry immediately started rifling through his things.  He handed me a t-shirt and a lightweight pair of trousers that he adjusted to fit once I’d put them on.  Automatically, I put my cardigan—now charmed clean—over the top.  Harry looked at me, smiled fondly and sighed.

 

“It’ll be hot in the club,” he said.  “As snugly as I’m sure your comfort blanket is, you can’t wear it.”  I gaped at him in surprise.  Comfort blanket indeed!  What a Sirius-thing to come out with; if it weren’t for the obvious physical similarities between Harry and James, there are times I could swear that Sirius had had an affair with Lily.  “Trust me.  You might be a bit chilly in just the t-shirt now, but you’ll be more than warm enough later.” 

 

Harry pointed out a slit along the seam of my trousers into which I could slide my wand, and he put in a pair of contact lenses, explaining that he didn’t want to deal with the bother of breaking or losing his glasses.  We then left the campervan, and immediately, I could hear music coming from an old Manor house in the distance.  By its front doors, there was a long queue of people stretching back as far as a car park on the other side of the house.

 

“We won’t have to queue,” Harry pointed out.  “Because we’re with Stuart and Neil.”

 

We wandered over to the club with Stuart, Neil and Gavin.  The others were friendly enough towards me—Gavin a lot more so than earlier.  But by the time we had entered the club, none of them had said anything to me directly apart from a brief “All righ’?”

 

“Don’t take it personally,” Harry said when the others had wandered off, leaving me and Harry alone just inside the doors.  “They just don’t trust strangers.”

 

The club was loud—too loud.  All of a sudden, I felt very old, worrying about what state my hearing would be in in the morning and realising that I must have been the oldest in the room by a clear ten years.  Evidently, we were at a gay club, which didn’t surprise me: Harry and Dean Thomas had been casually seeing each other for a few months before….  Well, let’s just say that Dean was one of those who didn’t live to see the end of Voldemort. 

 

Harry grabbed my arm and led me to the bar.  “Come on, then.  Let’s get you a drink.  We’ve got a long night ahead of us.”

 

He handed me a bottle of lager, and I looked at him curiously as he picked up a bottle of water from the counter for himself.

 

“Stay here.  I’ll be back in two ticks,” Harry said before making his way across the already crowded room to where Gavin was standing.

 

I watched carefully, not letting Harry out of my sight for a moment.  Gavin pulled a small packet out from the pocket of his jeans and handed something small to Harry, who promptly swallowed it with a gulp of water.  As soon as he returned, I asked him what he had taken.

 

“You’re here to protect me, not to nag me,” Harry said defiantly.  “You can hang around, but you don’t get to ask questions.  Not unless you want what I’ve had…”

 

“I think I’ll pass.” 

 

I couldn’t believe he had taken some sort of Muggle drug.  As if he wasn’t in enough danger as it was, but to add such an unknown quantity into the equation seemed to be asking for trouble.  Not wanting to annoy him further with the look of disapproval that I knew was plastered across my face, I turned away from him, telling myself that I would just have to do the best I could in keeping Harry safe, despite his blatant lack of concern for his own situation. 

 

As I turned away, it became clear that the majority of people in the room were also drinking water, like Harry; I guessed that whatever he had taken was very popular in the Muggle World.  Everyone in the club looked happy as they danced, talked, smoked and drank, happy as they bumped into each other, offering excessive apologies in a most sincere fashion.  The crowd on the dance floor was moving as a single, sweating entity, pulsating in time with the bass that pumped through the floorboards.  I was starting to sweat, too, the heat and the humidity of the club leaving my t-shirt and trousers sticking to underarm and crotch.  All the while, Harry was enthusiastically chatting in my ear about the clubs he had been to so far.

 

About twenty minutes or so later, I couldn’t help but gasp at the change in Harry’s appearance.  He had a softness about his face—except for his jaw, with which he was grinding away at a piece of chewing gum—and beads of sweat were dotted across his brow.  But it was his eyes that had struck me the most, with those beautiful, haunting, black pupils that were gazing up at me and were far larger than I had ever seen them.

 

“Time for some dancing,” Harry said.  “You coming?”

 

I shook my head and chuckled.  Me?  Dancing in a place like that?  At my age?  I was more than content to just lean back and watch everyone else while I drank. 

 

I had never seen Harry look so relaxed.  When he was out dancing amongst the throng of the crowd, he looked completely at ease with himself, smiling, occasionally laughing with people nearby.  Going by the amount of people Harry was communicating with in one way or another, he seemed to have met quite a few people over the past three weeks.

 

Taking in more of the club, I saw that most of the people there had the same soft expression as Harry, complete with jaw muscles that clenched and owl-like eyes.  As I stood at the bar, I was surprised that a few men even came up and asked me to dance.  It was very tempting when approached by such Adonis-like young men, but I was there to keep an eye on Harry, not to socialise.

 

Harry was now soaked through with sweat.  I watched, mesmerised, as he stopped dancing to run his hands through his hair, and hanging his head back so that his Adam’s apple jutted out, he gulped at his bottle of water.  Then he tipped the remainder of the bottle over his head, his hair clinging damply to his scalp, rivulets of water travelling down his face and neck.  Harry looked at me, and I felt my stomach hit the floor; it had been far too long since I had had any physical contact of the type that I was currently craving.

 

He blithely walked up to the bar and stood far too close for my liking.  Ordering another bottle of water and another bottle of lager for me, Harry then removed his t-shirt, peeling it from his skin and tucking it in to his trousers at the back to let it hang over his thighs.  I dragged my eyes upwards, away from that bare, sweat-slicked torso. 

 

“After all those complaints you made about the Yule Ball, you seem to be doing fine with dancing,” I said, desperately willing all my inappropriate thoughts about Harry to disappear.

 

“This is different,” he protested.  “There aren’t any rigid steps to learn, and I’m not out there on display—not like I was with that first dance with Parvati.  Are you gonna come up and dance, or are you gonna stand there all night?”

 

“I’m staying here.”

 

“Suit yourself.”

 

And then Harry made his way back to the floor, back to the heaving, sweaty crowd, leaving me to watch in guilty fascination. 

 

I couldn’t drag my eyes away as a tall, fair-haired man started dancing with Harry.  Harry gave the man a beaming smile and danced closer and closer, until both bodies were pressed up together, legs insinuated in between legs, the beat of the music punctuating the movement of their hips.  Arms were swung around necks, lips were a scant inch apart, eyes were locked onto each other.  Watching Harry dance with that man had given me an erection, and I shifted awkwardly before glancing down and feeling relieved that it wouldn’t be obvious to anyone else. 

 

I looked back over at Harry, and the fair-haired man caught my eye.  He said a few words to Harry, who turned and winked at me.  Harry then shook his head at the man and leant in for a deep kiss that looked far too passionate for a dance floor.  Harry hung his head back as his neck was kissed and he seemed to be shivering, his eyes closing, mouth gaping, holding onto the body in front of him as he was groped and licked and toyed with. 

 

Eventually, Harry pushed away and moved to drink from his bottle, but it was empty.  The man he was with gave him his water to drink, and I could see Harry’s lips move, saying something, gesturing in my direction.  Harry then walked uncertainly from the dance floor.  Alarmed at the way he was walking—hesitant and faltering—I jumped up to help him over to a bench on one side of the room.

 

I could feel from where I supported him under his arm and across his back that he was burning up.  Sweat dripped from his skin, and he sat down heavily.  I sat next to him, and he slumped against me as Sirius used to do, resting his head on the back of the bench, his lower jaw starting to judder, his eyes rolling back in their sockets.  I had only heard about Muggle drugs through the news, and as far as I was concerned, this didn’t look good.

 

“Harry, I think I should get you out of here.”

 

Harry lifted his head up and looked at me with a blissful smile plastered across his face.  “I’m fine,” he insisted.  “I’m just rushing my head off at the moment, that’s all.”  He laid a hand on my thigh and added, “It’s nice to know you care, though.”

 

Then Harry inhaled deeply and let his head fall back once more, the hand on my thigh firmly—and subconsciously, it seemed—running up and down its length, making my cock twitch.  I was scared that he was wrong, that it was something he should be worrying about, but I told myself that I had to trust he knew what he was talking about.  I watched Harry’s lip wobble slightly with each in-breath and stared in gross fascination at the whites of Harry’s eyes.  And then with one last body shudder, whatever it was seemed to be over and Harry was looking at me, all heavy-lidded, breathing deeply, his hand still on my thigh.  He reached for the water bottle, knocking back several gulps, stood up determinedly and grabbed me by the hand.

 

“You’ve been antisocial enough for one evening.  I’m getting you another drink and then we’re dancing.”

 

“Har—”

 

“No.  No excuses.  We can go into the backroom—it’s darker in there and you don’t have to worry about anyone watching you.”

 

He pulled me out of my seat and along to the bar, and I hurriedly squashed any thoughts of me dancing with Harry in the same way that the fair-haired man had done.

 

“What about that man you were dancing with earlier?” I asked.

 

“What about him?”

 

“Shouldn’t you be dancing with him?”

 

“Why?  He’s not my boyfriend or anything.  We were just having a bit of fun.”  He thrust a fresh bottle of lager into my hand—I’d lost count of the amount I’d had at that point—and took hold of my other hand to lead me to the backroom.  “Besides, I don’t want you to have to just stand there and watch me all evening.  It’s really nice that you’re here to keep me safe, but I think you can do that and have fun as well.”

 

The backroom had music much like the main room, but it was smaller and darker.  I could smell something pungent that I recognised but couldn’t quite put my finger on until I saw Stuart smoking.  It was grass—something I hadn’t had since my school days at Hogwarts when Sirius would occasionally smuggle some up to the dormitory. 

 

Harry came to a sudden stop, causing me to plough into him.

 

“All right there, Stu, where d’you get that from?” Harry asked, indicating the joint.

 

Stuart gave him a sly smile and pulled out what looked to be an ordinary packet of cigarettes, flashing them at Harry.

 

“Gis one, then!”

 

“As it’s you,” Stuart said, taking one from the packet and handing it over.  “Break off the filter and smoke it from the other end—they’ve been roached.  ‘Ere, you seen Gavin abou’?”

 

“He was by the bar in the other room, last time I saw him.”

 

“Cheers.” 

 

Stuart left for the main room, and Harry wandered over to an empty table on which he could place his bottle before lighting the joint and inhaling. 

 

“You want some?” Harry asked, holding it out.

 

I tried to make sense of what was happening.  That morning, I had been in the middle of hunting down Harry in order to persuade him to return to Grimmauld Place, and now, I was in the middle of a noisy, sweaty club, along with a Harry who was adamant about not going back.  My head was starting to swim from the noise and the lager and the heat and from watching Harry looking so relaxed and….so sensuous, damn it.  God knew I needed something to help get my head around things, or perhaps to just switch it off from trying to think about them.  I took the joint.

 

I felt the nicotine hit first; it had been years since I had even smoked an ordinary cigarette.  This left me feeling woozy for a moment, and I knocked back a swig of lager to wipe the acrid taste of smoke from the back of my mouth, and then placed my bottle on the table beside Harry’s.  I inhaled once more before contemplating that perhaps I shouldn’t be smoking and drinking at the same time.

 

“I had a huge crush on you in the third year,” Harry suddenly announced very sincerely, nearly making me choke on my second lungful.  “I still find you very attractive.”

 

After watching him all evening and reacting the way I had, the last thing I needed to hear was how he had a crush on me: the situation was far too tempting, even without that knowledge.

 

“Harry, I don—”

 

“Really.  Ron thought I was nuts, and Hermione just tried to be mature and understanding about boys having crushes on older male role models, but she never really understood.  Don’t hog it.”  Harry grabbed the joint back, letting his fingers slide over my hand as he did so.  “Do you want a blow-back?”

 

“Huh?” I frowned, surprised at the sudden shift in conversation, but also relieved that he had stopped talking about finding me attractive.

 

“A blow-back.  Do you want one?  You know what it is, right?”

 

“Yes,” I said absently.  Yet again, Sirius had been responsible for enlightening me about that activity—of turning the joint round between your lips and blowing the smoke into someone else’s mouth. 

 

I realised that, whereas I had actually only answered Harry’s second question, he had assumed I was answering his first.  He promptly took hold of the back of my head with one hand and guided me down to where the butt-end of the joint was sticking out from between his lips.  Automatically, I opened my mouth, cupping it around Harry’s, a hair’s breadth away from the moist skin of Harry’s face, and I inhaled until Harry had run out of breath. 

 

Leaning upright, I closed my mouth, my head spinning.  I felt a hand slide up my arm, and I looked over at Harry.

 

“You okay?” Harry asked, and I nodded. “Give us one, then.” 

 

Having participated so far, it seemed silly at that point to refuse.  I took the proffered joint and tapped the ash from the end before carefully placing it between my lips.  Harry buried his hand in my hair and leant in to place his mouth around mine, sucking in the smoke as I blew on the joint, his lips brushing against my skin, sweat dripping down his face and collecting on the hairs of my moustache. 

 

After Harry had moved away and I had removed the joint, I caught myself instinctively dipping my tongue out to taste the sweat left on my upper lip.  Then the hand that was still entangled in my hair was pulling me down towards Harry’s mouth once more.  Harry was still holding his breath from the blow-back and I knew what he wanted me to do.  Unable to stop myself, I obediently cupped my mouth around Harry’s a second time, inhaling the recycled smoke as Harry breathed out, dropping the joint to the floor in surprise as I felt Harry’s tongue briefly snake out to tease at my upper lip.  I looked down and hastily put the joint out with my shoe, and then Harry was coaxing me closer to his face, his eyes burning right through me with their intensity.  

 

I could’ve drowned in those pupils, and to be honest, I think I did for a while.  Time seemed to slow down as we drew nearer and nearer —not slow enough for me to stop what was happening, but just enough for me to register how wrong it was.  Kissing Harry Potter.  Kissing James Potter’s son.  The one whom I—a supposed father figure—was meant to be looking out for, meant to be keeping out of trouble.

 

Despite the bitter aroma of smoke, it was like tasting heaven when our lips finally collided, my head feeling foggy, as if it was only a dream.  It was a kiss that I knew I shouldn’t be participating in, even though I felt powerless to resist it.  I think I’d have to be some sort of saint to turn Harry down in that situation.

 

My hands found their way to his naked waist, the music pumping in my head and throughout my body, driving me forwards, and I started to trace over the skin with my fingertips, drawing Harry closer as he pushed a thigh between my legs and began to rub up against me.  I was in way over my head, but there didn’t seem to be any backing out, not now that Harry’s hands were massaging my arse, his mouth practically welded to my own and his excitement very apparent against my leg.

 

“Come with me,” he muttered against my lips, stepping backwards and taking my hand to drag me to another part of the club—to the toilets.  I let him lead me away, all sense of rationality having long since fled my mind.

 

The first cubicle was occupied, as was the second, but the door to the third one swung open as Harry kicked at it with his foot, and he pulled me inside, locking the door behind us. 

 

The instant the bolt of the lock had clicked home, we were locked together in a frantic jumble of lips and limbs, Harry getting straight to the point and tugging my trousers and underpants down to my knees.  I ran my hands over his body in a state of disbelief, relishing every contour as if he were some sort of holy relic, guilty enthusiasm spurring me on.  Then he was whispering in my ear, telling me he wanted to fuck me, there, in that cubicle.  How could I say no when I was so hard and his fingers were sliding into the crevice of my arse?  He stepped back to pull on a condom, muttering a lubrication charm over the top, and I turned to brace myself on the cistern, ready to do something that felt beyond illicit. 

 

Yet again, time played tricks with my mind, seeming almost to stop as he buried himself inside me, his entry slow and controlled, giving me far too much opportunity to think about who I was about to be fucked by.  I felt the brush of his pubic hair against my arse, and he stilled, moving only to push my t-shirt up my back so he could lean down and lick his way along my spine.

 

“Harry…” I moaned, twitching my hips backwards, wanting—needing—to feel the friction of him moving inside me.

 

He moaned, his breath warm against my back, and he reached around me to grasp at my cock.  I bucked forwards and back, prompting him to begin fucking me in earnest.

 

I didn’t last long.  The methodical rhythm that he set, and the matching pace and firm grip on my cock, sending me over the edge in seconds, leaving me clinging on to the cistern, holding myself up in a post-orgasmic haze as he kept going and going, peppering my body with aftershocks as he occasionally brushed against my prostate.

 

I think I could’ve stood there all night with Harry fucking me.  As it was, I had no idea of how long we were there, with him screwing me senseless.  Eventually, he stopped, resting his forehead against the damp t-shirt that was bunched up around my shoulders, his breath coming in hot pants.

 

“Bollocks,” he muttered, a touch of amused acceptance in his voice.  He gave one last, half-hearted thrust of his hips and added, “I can’t come.”

 

It was the pill he had taken.  He told me this later—although he still avoided telling me exactly what that pill was—and he pointed out that he didn’t mind too much, though: he had been grateful just to get it up in the first place and he had still enjoyed fucking me.

 

We cleared up in a dazed silence, him binning the condom, me casting a Scourgify charm over the toilet lid, and all the while, Harry occasionally grabbing me to press intense kisses against whatever body part was nearest to him at the time: lips, waist, elbow.

 

Harry took me back to the bar to buy a few more bottles of lager and water.  He then spied Stuart and offered an obscene amount of Muggle money for some more joints to smoke.  From there, it was just a short walk back to his trailer, with us drinking and smoking on the way. 

 

All I can remember of what followed are hazy pictures of more drinking and smoking, clothes being shed and us ending up naked in his bed—both of us impotent by that point.  I do have a fond memory of him licking me, though, as I lay sprawled across his covers.  He kept swirling his tongue over my sweatiest areas, telling me that he’d usually be eating peanuts by now—to replace the body salts he’d lost through sweating—but he much preferred the taste of me.  All the while, I drifted in and out of consciousness, telling myself that this was only a dream and that I would have nothing to feel guilty about the following day.

 

**

 

Afternoon conversation:

 

I woke with a painful crick in my neck and ringing in my ears.  Stretching, I grimaced when the memory of the previous night came back to me, highlighted by the fact that a naked Harry Potter was currently wrapped around me.  Needing a long drink of water, I prized myself from him—carefully, so as not to wake him—and pulled on the t-shirt and trousers from the previous night.  To say I felt mortified by the turn in events was a bit of an understatement.

 

I sat at the table and stared at the sleeping body in front of me.  What on earth did I think I was doing?  I was supposed to be keeping Harry safe, not giving in to my groinal urges and having sex with him.  And as for the lager I consumed—and what I had been smoking—if a Death Eater had shown up, there was no way I would have been in a fit state to protect Harry.  I was hardly doing a good job of keeping Harry away from insidious influences.  I was going to have to stay teetotal for the rest of the summer if I was going to keep Harry safe, either that, or leave Harry to his own devices, which I promptly told myself wasn’t an option.  What else could I do?  I did not want to force him back to Grimmauld Place, and Harry had made it quite clear the day before that he wasn’t planning on going back under his own steam until the start of term.

 

Harry woke about an hour later, after I had boiled the kettle and cleaned up a couple of mugs for tea.  He dressed and sat next to me at the table, looking very tired, with dark circles under his eyes.

 

“You shouldn’t be here doing this sort of thing,” I said, half-hoping that he had had an epiphany somewhere along the way and was now going to say that he was ready to return to the Wizarding World.

 

“You didn’t seem to mind so much last night,” he bit back with a smirk, placing a hand on the inside of my thigh.

 

“Last night…was a mistake.  We shouldn’t have done…what we did.”  I removed his hand from my leg.  “What on earth did you take at the club?”

 

“As I said before, you’re here to protect me, not to nag me,” he said defiantly, scowling at me from behind his mug.  “I don’t mind you hanging around, but you don’t get to tell me what to do.”

 

“I’m not trying to tell you to stop; I just…you must realise just how vulnerable you are on that stuff.”

 

“You weren’t exactly sober yourself.”

 

“I know, and I won’t be getting in that state again.  It’s too risky.  It could have been so easy for anyone to get to you last night.”

 

“I’ve been okay, so far.”

 

“Perhaps that’s just because most of the suspected Death Eaters are either in Azkaban or are still being investigated.  A Ministry investigation might make it more difficult for them to go after you, but the moment they do get an opportunity, you won’t be able to defend yourself.”

 

“Anyway you’re here, now, to keep an eye on me.”

 

“But I don’t know how well I can protect you when you’re like…that.  It’s not…safe.”  I was painfully aware of the hidden meaning behind my words, of how unsafe he had been with me.

 

“So you’d prefer it if I was safely holed up at Grimmauld Place, just like Sirius was?  Just what do you think you’ll be keeping me safe from?  Yourself?”  Harry looked at me pointedly.

 

“Harry—”

 

“No, seriously, Remus.  Knowing I’m safe is not enough.  It’s all very well shielding me from Death Eaters, but perhaps all I really need is protection from…myself.”  He gazed forlornly at the table, pushing his mug around in a circle, and his sudden air of despondency tugged at my heartstrings.  I wanted nothing more at that moment than to pull him close and squeeze his downcast mood away, but I didn’t dare to touch him.

 

“Now that the prophecy has been fulfilled,” he continued, “now that Voldemort is finally dead….  Well….  After everything I’ve lived through, it just seems like such a hollow victory.  What is left for me at the end of it?  I have two best friends who are off globetrotting together on a kind of pseudo-honeymoon, after which they’ll be moving into their cosy, one bed-roomed flat in Devon.  I have a pile of money in the bank—more than I’ll ever know what to do with.  I don’t need to work because of that; I don’t need to learn in order to get a job.  So I ask myself: what do I want to learn?  What do I want to spend my time doing?  And I don’t know.  Nothing inspires me.”

 

“Something will come up, I’m sure.”

 

“You can’t say that.”

 

“What about Quidditch?  You’ve always—”

 

“It’s just a game, Remus.  It doesn’t actually mean anything when you’re looking at the bigger picture.  It’s just a bit of entertainment to help pass the time.”

 

“Isn’t that similar to what you’re doing now, though?”

 

“No.  Meeting Gavin and the others…going clubbing…these Muggle drugs; they help me put things into perspective for a while.  When I take them, I’m living in the moment and it just feels…right, as if I’m a complete person; I’m no longer the Boy Who Lived, no longer just James and Lily’s son, or Ron and Hermione’s spare third wheel—I’m Harry Potter, through and through.  And all that shit I’ve been through…well, it stops being so important.  Everything I have to deal with in the Wizarding world fades away to insignificance and the pain disappears.”

 

“Sirius said something similar to me last year, only he was talking about the whisky bottle.”

 

“I’ve been drunk before, Remus, and it’s not the same thing.”

 

“But you’re doing it for the same reason: using it as a crutch to help you cope with what you’ve been dealt in life.”

 

“I guess so.  But doesn’t everyone have one: a crutch of some description?  Drugs, alcohol, food, money, power; it’s just a way of getting by.  I’d still rather be here, doing what I’m doing, than stuck inside Grimmauld Place and staring at the bottom of an empty bottle.”  He knocked back the rest of his tea and took both of our empty mugs to the sink, rinsing them clean.  “You’d tried to help Sirius, didn’t you.”

 

“He was a mess when he came out of Azkaban, and I…er…yes…I tried to help him in my own way…distracted him somewhat.  But I didn’t manage to do such a good job when he moved into his family home.”  With that memory brought to the surface, I was starting to feel despondent myself.  I hadn’t exactly succeeded with Sirius.  Our relationship, and the distractions it afforded, didn’t stop him from falling into a pit of self-loathing.  At the time, there had been too many other things that I was expected to do for the Order for me to focus on him.  “When I wasn’t there, he fell back on the whisky.  And because of that, it was so much harder to get close enough to help when I was there.”

 

“That wasn’t your fault.  You couldn’t be there all the time; I know you had a lot of work to do—you had to go away a lot.  I didn’t see him there much, but when I did and you were around, he always seemed to be so much happier.  You made a good substitute crutch for Sirius.”  Harry’s take on the situation left me feeling slightly better, and I smiled as he sat opposite me.  “You could always offer to be my substitute crutch,” He added with a sly smile and deliberately hooded eyes. 

 

It wasn’t difficult to guess what he was implying.

 

“Harry….”

 

“I mean it.  I’ll stop all this…go back…now.  Today.  I mean, they want me in Grimmauld Place, right?  You obviously don’t have urgent things to do for the Order or other stuff that will take up a lot of time, otherwise you wouldn’t be here offering to chaperone me for the rest of the summer.  Stay with me at Grimmauld Place.  You could help me during the day to go over the work I missed last year at school.  And in the evenings, you could dish out any rewards I’ve earned….”

 

As Harry spoke, I felt his socked foot worm its way up my leg to rub teasingly against my groin.  I shifted my hips back in the chair, away from the contact with Harry’s foot, and hung my head in my hands.

 

I was stunned that Harry had the gall to try and blackmail me into this—and such bitter-sweet blackmail, too.  I was even more appalled by the fact that I was tempted by his suggestion.  It was like being starved and then offered an all-you-can-eat buffet, but also knowing that it was laced with arsenic.  Harry had to be joking: there was no way he could seriously expect us to carry out a relationship of that nature at Grimmauld Place.

 

I started to chuckle at the absurdity of it all, my laughs dying in my throat as I looked up and saw how annoyed he seemed at my instant dismissal. 

 

“I’m serious!” he snapped at me.

 

“Harry, be reasonable.”

 

“Be reasonable?  You want me to go back to a place that reeks of death, and then re-do my final year at Hogwarts without any of my friends, without any desire to actually learn anything of what I’ll be expected to learn.  And for what?  What will I get out of the end of it?  Sometimes I wonder whether it’s worth my while going back at all.  Perhaps, I won’t make it on the Hogwarts’ Express in September.  I might as well continue living like this and not bother wasting my time with what other people expect me to do.”  Abruptly, he stood up, making it clear that the conversation was over.  “I’ve got to tidy up and get supplies.  We’re due to leave for the coast: there’s another club to go to this evening.”

 

**

 

Protecting Harry

 

Harry was curt with me until later on that evening.  And I admit that I made no effort to try and patch things up: I had already made the situation worse and was worried that trying to change his mind about going back in September would only make him dig in his heels even further.  I told myself that, for the moment, the best thing I could do would be just to keep an eye on him and hope that his threat of never going back was an empty one. 

 

Whether it was an empty threat or not, I knew that my time with Harry was going to take its toll on me.  Not long after we had entered the club and Gavin had provided him with some more Muggle drugs, Harry had soon warmed up to me.  A little too much.  And he made it clear that he wasn’t planning to ease off, that night or for the rest of the summer. 

 

I staunchly avoided any alcohol and all the offers of joints that Harry tried to pass my way.  I needed a clear head, and not just so I would be able to protect Harry if necessary: temptation was proving a bitch, to put it mildly.  All I could do was to react as impassively as I could as he flirted with me, try not to let myself be so captivated by his eyes or his body dripping with sweat, and diplomatically step away from the inappropriate contact that he kept on initiating.

 

“I love it that you’re my personal body-guard,” Harry mumbled as he helped himself to my water.  “I am so turned on right now, knowing that you’ve been watching me.  Why won’t you be my crutch?”

 

“You can’t have me, not like that.”

 

“I had you last night,” Harry said, pressing the length of his body up against mine for the fifth time that evening, this time pinning me between him and the wall; it was hard to resist, even without the alcohol and cannabis to fog up my head.  “And I want to have you again and again.”

 

“Harry, you’re too young,” I insisted, not trusting myself to say anything else.

 

“That wasn’t a problem yesterday.” 

 

“It should’ve been.”

 

“It’s only some misguided sense of moral obligation that’s holding you back.  If I had you as my crutch…”  He pinned my wrists to the wall, and I gasped at the lascivious smile on his face.  “I could take you back to my trailer right now, tie you up, force you.  If you insist on hanging around and being such an obvious stick-in-the-mud, I might do just that.”

 

Although he sounded distinctly amused as he spoke, I couldn’t help but feel intimidated.  After all, Harry had youth and strength on his side, and if he was serious, I probably wouldn’t stand much chance of fending him off.

 

Not waiting for a reply, he swept off to the dance floor, blatantly flirting with others in front of me, stripping his t-shirt and occasionally stopping to dowse himself in water.  Every once in a while he’d look over—usually while engaging in something explicit with another man—and he would purposefully catch my eye, as if to say, “This could be you.”

 

How could I not be aware that I had several more weeks of this to contend with before it would be time for Harry to return to Hogwarts?  And that was if Harry did decide to go back.  I had no idea how I was going to last without giving in to him at some point.

 

Feeling the heat of the club and having had enough of watching Harry acting so promiscuously, I walked outside to get some much-needed fresh air.  I hadn’t been outside for more than a couple of minutes when I caught sight of someone who didn’t quite fit in: someone who looked suspiciously like a wizard who didn’t know enough about Muggles.  Panic suddenly swept through me, and I dashed after the figure.  As I re-entered the club, I saw him point his wand in Harry’s direction, and I just had time to shove the unknown wizard sideways, causing him to miss his aim.  The spell only glanced across Harry’s right shoulder before dispersing harmlessly into the ceiling.

 

Looking back at the wizard, I saw that he was a suspected Death Eater who was currently under investigation: Will Travers.  I drew my wand immediately and Stunned him before he had a chance to turn on me.  Harry was by my side in seconds—not seriously harmed, I was relieved to note—and then people were starting to gather round, offering bottles of water, asking if the person out cold on the floor was okay.  Evidently, thanks to the drugs consumed, all those who had seen what happened had been happy to dismiss it all as a bizarre light show.  A couple of people helped us to carry Travers outside, and with a word of thanks, Harry and I insisted that we’d take care of him and no further help was necessary.

 

“We should take him back to the Ministry,” I said, “and then we’ll get you to St. Mungo’s—have that shoulder looked at.”

 

“It’s fine; it’s just a graze,” Harry insisted as he tentatively fingered the wound.  “And it won’t take two of us to escort him back to the Ministry.”  He looked at me stubbornly, adding, “I meant what I said earlier; I can’t think of any reason for me to go back now, or in September.”

 

“Harry, think about what you’re saying.  Do you really intend to cut yourself off from the Wizarding World for the rest of your life?”

 

“From where I’m standing, it doesn’t seem like such a big deal.”  He pulled his t-shirt from the back of his trousers and started to dab at the blood that had collected on his shoulder.

 

“Here, let me.”  I moved closer and ran my wand tip over the bleeding edges of the cut, murmuring a healing charm.

 

He sighed and leaned back onto my chest when I had finished.  “If I could buy you, I’d spend my every last galleon just to have you as my slave.”

 

Flustered, I stepped away from him.  “I should go.  There’s a pub not far from here that’s connected to the Floo Network.  I’ll be back later.” 

 

He turned, and taking me by surprise, grabbed my head to kiss me firmly on the lips.  Then without saying another word, he left me, to saunter casually back into the club.

 

As soon as he had gone, I reversed the Stupefying Charm, quickly replacing it with the Full Body Bind: I didn’t want to risk Travers coming round before I reached the Ministry.  Then I levitated his body and began to walk to the nearest Floo.

 

You’d think it would be easy enough to hand over Travers to the Ministry and be on my way.  But no, there’s not a lot you can do at the Ministry without getting involved in streams of paperwork, especially when you happen to be a werewolf.  They don’t like it when people like me effectively make what Muggles call a citizen’s arrest, and the fact that Harry had refused to come along only added to their distrust of what I was claiming.  Everything I said had to be recorded, signed, verified if possible, cross-checked, double-checked.  And all the time I was worrying about Harry.

 

Several hours later, I was finally trying to make my way out of the building to where I could Apparate back to Harry.  I was feeling decidedly worried about him by now.  What if another Death Eater had decided to attack tonight?  What if tonight he had a bad reaction to those Muggle drugs?  I fought my way against the crowd; it was morning and the time that most of the Ministry arrived for work.  Apart from a few who had been working the night shift, everyone was going in the opposite direction, and it was hard to push my way past them. 

 

“Remus!”

 

Up ahead I could see a hand waving above the mass of heads; it was Arthur Weasley.

 

Reluctantly, I let him drag me back to his tiny office where he could talk to me about Harry.  When we arrived, we found Moody sitting at Arthur’s desk and going through some paperwork.  Moody greeted me with a grunt.

 

“You caught up with the boy, yet?”

 

“Yes, and I really think I should be getting back,” I said, starting to tap my fingers against my leg in agitation.  “I don’t think he should be left on his own for long.”

 

“But how is he?” Arthur asked.  “You must have some news.  Molly is going frantic with worry.”

 

“He’s…fine.  He’s still refusing to come back, but I’ll be staying with him for the rest of the summer to keep an eye on him.”

 

“But he’s not hurt?  I just overheard Martha Edgecombe saying that you brought Travers in earlier.”

 

“No.  Travers didn’t do any harm, although he did try.”

 

“He won’t be the last,” Moody said as he passed a file across to Arthur.  “They’ve picked up Bellatrix Lestrange, but she had already helped the Death Eaters in Azkaban escape.  There were fourteen of them in there.  Surely this’ll change Harry’s mind.”

 

I rubbed my hands across my face, suddenly feeling the effects of having been awake so long.  Fourteen Death Eaters on the loose.  I would’ve laid my last knut on what Harry would say about that. 

 

“I doubt it,” I said.  “He refuses to acknowledge the danger he’s in.  Even if he was forced, he wouldn’t stay, and we’d probably only succeed in completely turning him against the Wizarding World.”

 

“Damn idiot!” Moody barked, making me jump.  “The longer that boy keeps himself segregated from the rest of us, the harder it’ll be for him to return in the long run.”

 

I shifted uncomfortably on my feet, not wanting to fill them in on Harry’s recent change of heart about Hogwarts.  If only I could get him to change his mind.

 

The door clicked open, and I had to step to one side to avoid being hit.  It was Perkins.

 

“Arthur, we’ve had an enchanted bicycle turn up and it’s causing havoc in reception.  Can you give me a hand?”

 

“Okay.”  Arthur turned to me before he left and added, “At least you’re with him.  Molly will feel much better knowing that.”

 

I made to follow him, hoping to get back to Harry, but Moody pulled me back inside the office.

 

“There’s something else you’re not saying, Remus.  Out with it.”

 

Moody stared at me with both eyes, waiting for an answer, making me wish that Arthur hadn’t caught me before I left the Ministry.  “He…he might not come back at all,” I finally admitted.

 

“That boy is going to upset a lot of people by the time he’s finished, and that’s if he survives long enough for anyone else to find out his plans.  God knows how Molly is going to take the news; it’ll break her heart.”

 

Of course, Molly would be the one most affected by Harry’s absence.  She saw herself as a surrogate mother, and before I originally went searching for Harry, I had already seen how much she was tearing herself up over his disappearance.

 

“Is there nothing you can do to get him back in Grimmauld Place?”

 

I swallowed.  Yes.  Yes, there was.

 

**

 

Grimmauld Place

 

So I persuaded Harry to come back.  Well, I guess ‘persuade’ is not exactly the right word, as it’s only a very loose definition of what I’ve done—offered myself to him as a virtual slave is more like it.  You should have seen the size of his grin when I told him.  And it didn’t fade when I insisted that we kept it quiet because if anyone should find out about our arrangement, they’d have me shipped out of Grimmauld Place in an instant.  He said that didn’t worry him: he could wait for any guests to leave before helping himself to me.

 

I guess the prospect of being able to have sex with Harry for the rest of the summer should be a good one, but I’m feeling decidedly edgy about it.  And not just because what I’m doing is morally questionable at best.  Having him suddenly pin my arms behind my back when he was collecting his things together in the campervan and then having him whisper against my neck, “When can I start abusing you?” only added to my anxiety.  He called me a tease when I said he’d have to wait until we were back in Grimmauld Place, and he added that I’d be making it up to him later.  The brief allusion he made to “naughty werewolves who need to be punished” brought me out in a cold sweat: I’ve always had a phobia for whips, as Sirius once found out when he thought about spicing up our sex life.

 

Perhaps Harry had only been joking, but I can’t keep the thought out of my head, not after he disappeared inside a Muggle sex shop on the way back and refused to show me what he had bought.  The only thing I know about is the leather harness, which he insisted I put on then and there in the public toilets, because he wants me ready for him.

 

The harness consists of thin leather straps that encase my cock and balls, and it’s backless, with two more straps that run diagonally over my arsecheeks and underneath to connect with the leather over my balls.  To top it off there’s one last strap that hangs down loose at the front—like a leash.  This has Property of Harry Potter engraved along it; he wants something to lead me round with, and something to hold onto as he fucks me.  He told me to put a breathable charm on the leather so I don’t sweat and chafe myself too much on it, and also a charm to allow it to expand when I get hard.  At least there does seem to be some concern towards my comfort, and I must admit, the leather does feel good against my skin, but the fact I’m wearing it due to blackmail does not sit well with me.

 

I’m now sat in the kitchen of Grimmauld Place, wearing that harness underneath my trousers while Molly and Arthur clear up the dishes.  They refused to let me help; they don’t appreciate that it would help take my mind off things.  Harry isn’t too impressed by all the unexpected company, but Molly was desperate to see him eating a decent meal, and as there had been an Order meeting, a few people had hung around to share in Molly’s good cooking.  Everyone, of course, was keen to see Harry.  It seemed to be a bit much for him, but they’ll be leaving soon—in a few minutes, in fact.  I wish they weren’t.

 

Alastor Moody is the last one to leave, and I’m left gaping at the door when he lowers his voice and says with a wink, “Interesting bag of tricks young Harry’s got there.  Mind he doesn’t wear you out too much.”

 

My stomach sinks to my feet as I watch one of his eyes look downwards, straight at my crotch.  How could I be so stupid as to forget about his magical eye?

 

“Are you okay?” Harry asks as I close the door, winding his arms around me from behind.

 

“Alastor…” I stutter.  “He knows.”

 

The arms move away and Harry speaks again, tensely this time.  “Is he going to do anything about it?”

 

“He wouldn’t have left us here alone if he was worried.”

 

“Good.  Get your leash out then.”

 

Taking a deep breath, I comply, my hands shaking as I lower my zipper.  When I face him, he takes the leash in his hand, leading me back to the kitchen, to where that omninous brown paper bag is sitting on the table.  I can only stand there in an agonised silence as he helps himself to the front of my trousers, undoing the button and pushing them to the floor.  He kneels to flick his tongue over my cock, between the straps of leather.  The warmth and wetness feels good, but I’m not getting any harder.

 

Again, he asks me if I’m okay, and I say yes.  As if I’m likely to say no.  As if, having finally got him here, I’m going to say that this is anything but okay, that I’ve changed my mind.  Because I can’t change my mind.  He has to stay.

 

He turns me round to face the table and coaxes my legs apart, my trousers feeling restrictive around my ankles.  He tells me to bend over, to lean across the table.  As I do so, he pushes my shirt up, just as he did in the club, only now it bunches up over my nipples, caught between me and the wooden surface.  I feel two hands groping at my arse, a tongue spiralling its way up my spine, and I shiver.  One hand is removed and there is the sound of his zipper followed by a groan as he rubs his cock along the crease of my arse.  Please, please don’t let him think of dry-humping me.

 

I hear the bag rustle next to me and I turn my head, but I can’t see what he’s taking out of it.  As he steps away from me, I can’t stop myself from tensing, anticipating a sharp sting across my backside at any moment.  But it doesn’t come—not yet.  It must have been lubricant, because one of his fingers is cold and wet as it pushes its way inside me, followed by another.  Finally, I start to get hard, the leather moulding itself around me as my cock grows.  I push back against Harry’s fingers, making the most of the pleasurable sensations, hoping that he will be too eager to fuck me to want to do anything more.

 

But, no.  He reaches over with his unlubed hand and the bag rustles once more.  I wait with baited breath to find out what is to come next.

 

“I’ve bought you a butt plug,” he says as he pulls his fingers from my arse.  “Can I make you squirm?”

 

I nod as best I can with my head lying sideways on the table, figuring there’s no point in telling him that, inside, I have done nothing but squirm since the others left. 

 

The buttplug, slick with lubricant, breaches me and I gasp.  He is kissing my back and I feel his lips curl into a smile.  Pushing it all the way in, he says a charm to make the plug vibrate, and instantly, my legs turn to jelly.  I’m panting heavily against the table as my hips start to grind of their own volition, awkwardly rubbing myself, trying to ignore the slight chafe of the leather as it catches my cock on each thrust.

 

“Why did you flinch?” he asks, and I say nothing.  My mind is too fogged to work out what he means.  He asks me again, adding, “When I went to get something from the bag.  Both times, you tensed up.”

 

“I…I…” I can’t bring myself to say it.  Having come so far, now was not the time to tell him that I was scared.  “Just…anticipation,” I say feebly in between moans.

 

“Don’t lie to me.”  The vibrating stops.  “Remus, what are you afraid of?”

 

“I’m here for you,” I start to say, my voice sounding breathless, “like you said, to do whatever you want to.  It’s not my place to question what you’ve bought.”

 

“Right now, what I want is for you to tell me just what you think I’m going to do.”

 

And I don’t know what else to say, apart from the truth.  “Whip me,” I admit, cringing at how silly it sounds and hoping my reluctance doesn’t change his mind.  “You said you were going to punish me...for making you wait.”

 

I hear him gasp.

 

“I was only teasing,” he says, pulling me upright, turning me round to face him.  He studies my face, a frown appearing across his brow.  “I wouldn’t ever do something like that unless you wanted me to.”

 

I let out a breath of relief, one that I didn’t realise I’d been holding onto, and I watch as he chews on his bottom lip for a moment before he speaks again.

 

“But you’d let me, anyway—just to keep me here, to keep me where you think I’m safest.”

 

I drop my head, feeling like a naughty schoolboy who’s just been caught doing something he shouldn’t.  Was I wrong to be so willing?  Was this not what he wanted?  But when I look up, he’s smiling at me, a brilliant, beaming smile that warms me inside. 

 

He leans in and we’re kissing, soft, tender kisses.  For the first time since we’ve been there, I touch him, my hands on his back, drawing him closer to me.

 

“Sit on the table,” he murmurs against my lips, and I do so.

 

He pulls off my shoes and then my trousers before stripping himself and joining me on the table.  He pushes me to lie on my back, sliding the buttplug from my arse and chucking it on the floor.

 

“Remus, if you’re going to be my crutch, then you’d better get one thing clear: I want you to enjoy this as much as I do,” he says as he unbuttons my shirt, leaning down to swirl a tongue around each nipple.  “What do you want?”

 

“Fuck me,” I gasp.  “Please.”

 

I spread and bend my legs ready, and he grabs at the bag one more time to retrieve a condom.  As soon as he has put it on, his hand strays towards the ties of my harness.  I have a hunch what he is going to do, and now that I’m no longer worried about the situation, I don’t mind leaving it on.  I rest my hand on his to stop him.

 

“I like your earlier idea of having something to hold onto.”

 

He smirks at me and jumps down to the floor, putting his hands on my hips to drag me to the edge of the table.  I feel his cock against me, and he eases all the way inside, leaving me groaning and clutching at his arms, trying to gain purchase on something.  He takes hold of my leash, using it to pull me against him as he thrusts into me, fucking me harder and harder, making me cry out with the thrill of being taken this way.

 

Like the other night, I don’t last long, not after all I’ve through.  The combination of anticipation, the buttplug, and now, Harry fucking me as he holds on to my crotch is too much.  I swear loudly, my come veering off to one side, deflected by the strap that sits across the head of my cock.  But unlike the other night, Harry comes soon after me, collapsing on my stomach in a boneless heap.

 

We lie there for a while, catching our breath, and then he gets up to lead me along by the leash to the bedroom.  He unfastens the straps to the harness, and this time I let him.  Then we’re kissing and stumbling our way to the bed, where he pulls me close under the duvet.

 

“Do you still want to be my crutch, Remus?”

 

I look at him and chuckle.  Having been reasurred that he doesn’t intend to use me indiscriminately, I’m now eagerly looking forward to the rest of the summer.  I do have a hunch that Harry is going to prove highly addictive and that our few weeks together won’t be enough.  But right now, with his warm body pressed up against mine I can’t bring myself to care about that.

 

“Definitely,” I murmur, pressing light kisses along his neck.  “But I do expect you to return the favour next summer.”

 

***

 

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