Disclaimer: It's not mine and my lawyer would like to say that whatever I told people, it should be taken into account that I was on pain medication at the time.

A/N: Once the awkward silence is over, this is going to require an explanation. Where Dwell the Brave at Heart was the first big fan fiction piece I ever wrote. That was back in 2009. Four years on, a lot of the other things I've written tie into it. I tend to keep them all in the same universe. So I tend to send people to the original first. It doesn't give anyone a good impression.

I have a lot of other things I should be doing (including in real life), but the original makes me cringe so much. Looking back, there are so many problems I have with it. That's why I'm not just going back and editing the chapters. The reviews and their constructive criticism wouldn't really make a lot of sense and I'd like to leave them up because they taught me so much.

So I'm re-writing it. There are a lot of reasons why really, but that's the big one. I'm not abandoning my other stuff, even though it's been a while. I'll be updating this every Friday anyway because most of it is already outlined.

December 1995

"This is for Harry from you and me."

Sirius lifts the beautifully wrapped red parcel and weighs it in his hands. "What is it?"

"It's a complete set of books."

Sirius rolls his eyes and smiles affectionately. "What else would it be?"

"Well, yes, but these are wonderful. I mean they're perfect." Lupin's eyes light up. "They'll teach him everything he's missing out on and you should see the illustrations. If I could afford them, I'd keep them for myself. Look, I hope you don't mind splitting it." His right arm snakes around his neck. "I managed to haggle the price down, but it's still pretty extortionate."

Sirius' eyes narrow in suspicion. "How did you haggle?"

"Well, I pulled out Volume One, got a good grip on the spine, flicked through the pages, rubbed the illustrations a bit, and then told the manager I had Leprosy."

"You're joking, Remus."

"Of course I'm joking. I haggled the way everyone haggles. I noticed he hadn't sold any yet and told him what I'd give him for one, but I wanted to keep it fair and the illustrations really are fantastic, so…"

"At least it's not faulty."

Lupin looks affronted. "I don't buy faulty gifts."

Sirius raises an eyebrow. "Name one thing you have bought at discount price which I've not had to fix. There was the record player that one year - that was eventful, that clock with the planets orbiting it, the talking doormat, the Droobles dispenser machine in which I nearly lost my arm."

"Yes, but they weren't gifts. They were for me. Speaking of for me." He reaches into his brown leather satchel and pulls out a parcel the size of a matchbox. It too has been wrapped in the same dull red paper. "This is for me from you."

Sirius nods curtly. "Thanks."

Lupin laughs pathetically to end the silence that descends. "No. It's my gift. 'Thanks' is my line."

"I feel awful."

Lupin smiles brightly. "Well, don't. This is the one sensible Christmas present you've ever given me."

"Christmas presents aren't supposed to be sensible."

"Mine are. That's how I like them. Practical."

Sirius peers at the present which fits neatly into the palm of his hand, as though trying to render the wrapping paper transparent. "What is it?"

Lupin smiles grimly. "It's a lens for my camera. I broke it years ago. I thought maybe I might start taking photographs again. You know, lots of new people and…"

Neither of them says it. Lots of memories you wished you'd captured; lots of wakes requiring framed portraits of laughing Order members.

Lupin shakes his head, trying to forcibly remove the morbid train of thought that follows. He had sat at Sirius' kitchen table, when the Order had first reassembled, his eyes focusing on each person in turn, wondering who might not join them in the new year, and hated himself for it. He assumed it might be the reckless, the brave and foolish - as James had been. Sirius fits the bill nicely and Lupin is relieved that he is under what equates to house arrest. Perhaps Nymphadora Tonks, young enough to be unaware of the atrocities the others had seen? Lupin shudders. He doesn't want to imagine her funeral, her photograph resting on the coffin as she makes faces behind a pane of glass. She is more alive than any of them.

"So," he says, wrapping his cardigan tightly around him, though Sirius' room is more than adequately heated, "I thought new year, new lens."

"For the Kodak?" Sirius gives a small, pathetic, barely audible laugh. "You've still got that?"

"Well, my dad bought it for me so…" Lupin shifts his weight to his left leg and stares out of the window onto the busy Islington street below. "I can't bring myself to replace it."

Sirius bites his lower lip, slight creases forming on his forehead. "What happened to all those photographs?"

Lupin shrugs, attempting to sound casual - as though he doesn't stare at them when he is in the depths of despair. "Oh, they're around somewhere."

Sirius is notoriously difficult to buy for, so Lupin doesn't suppose immersing himself in their past in a bid for inspiration is all that surprising.

He finds himself sitting amongst them, piling them around him in turrets, building himself a fortress of photographs. He doesn't know why any of them were taken. They don't capture any momentous events. Most appear to have been taken on a whim, because James had made a particularly disastrous move on Lily, because Sirius and Peter were brewing something unspeakable, their heads bent over Peter's cauldron at the foot of his bed.

He stares down at his three twelve-year-old friends who are rolling their eyes at him. They'd been in the middle of a discussion when the flash had almost blinded them in the corner of their eyes.

"Jesus, Remus."

"Watch what you're doing with that thing. If you got a horn for it, you could steer ships in the dark."

"What did you even want a picture for?"

He couldn't tell them it was because they were bound to figure him out sooner or later and he wanted proof that the past year had not been a dream, so he shrugged.

"Just testing it. I got a new bulb."

Lupin reaches for the last of the wrapping paper.

"Thank you."

Lupin jumps, almost dropping the large box he was carrying down two flights of stairs. "Harry! Happy Christmas. I'm glad you like them. Sirius didn't really want to get you books, I don't think, but I thought they'd come in handy."

Harry grins. "Yeah, I've already found a use for them."

Lupin returns the smile. "As long as it's not doorstops." There's something in his responding smile - something decidedly reminiscent of James, something unnerving. Lupin chooses to ignore it. Whatever Harry has got planned is none of his business.

"Oh and Sirius is looking for you. Something about the Christmas presents you buy yourself."

Lupin laughs. "Right."

March 10th 1971.

"Happy birthday."

Lupin nodded. The box was heavy in his hands and he was frightened that he'd drop it. "Thank you."

"I wanted to get you something to take to school."

His father beamed down at him, nodding. Lupin set the box on the kitchen table, not wanting to admit that he was terrified of going to Hogwarts, that he was grateful for his father's efforts, but really he'd be much happier at home.

"Thanks."

"Go on then. Open it."

He thought it might be his textbooks, but his mother usually gave him books or several other small things she was sure he'd enjoy. His father's guilt made him somewhat overzealous, buying gifts he could present to the crown prince of some exotic locale.

It was a small black and silver camera marked 'Kodak Retina IIa'.

"Your mum says there's a newer model on the market, but I thought this one looked a bit nicer."

His son said nothing, staring at the camera.

"If you don't like it, Remus-"

Lupin shook his head. "No, I do. I love it."

"I don't have many photographs of my friends and I don't see some of them so much these days. I was very young when we had you. One minute they were all telling me your mother was quite a catch and the next, they treated fatherhood like a contagious infection. Eventually, you're all going to go your separate ways and I want you to have more than memories."

"I want you to have more than memories."

Sirius stares up at him, his hands still buried deep in the box of photographs which had been wrapped in red ribbon. "What'll you have?"

"Oh, I have duplicates and I haven't given them all to you. I tried to choose just those I thought you'd like."

Sirius shakes his head in disbelief. "I…thank you. Really. Thank you."

"And you're not to mope over them. That's the one condition."

Sirius raises an eyebrow. "You give Christmas presents with conditions now?"

Lupin frowns. "I moped. I moped over them for twelve years. It's not an easy habit to break. Some of them I burned, some I gave to Harry, some I defaced after half a bottle of whiskey. So just promise me you won't mope over them."

Sirius nods. "Yes. No. I mean…" He shakes his head. "You gave photographs to Harry?"

"Hagrid asked me for a couple. Technically Hagrid gave photographs to Harry. They're mostly pictures of Lily and James. You're in a few. So's Peter. I didn't give him any of James' school photos. I thought he'd want pictures of his family rather than…well, pictures that don't really mean anything. I deliberately kept myself out of it. I thought I was the only person left he could ever track down and that was the last thing I thought I wanted."

There's a funny glint in Sirius' eyes. "So he's not seen any of these?"

Lupin shakes his head. His eyes widen in understanding. "No. I was in a position of authority. I was his teacher, Sirius."

Sirius grins. "But you're not anymore."

"I'm still in a position of care. So are you. Even more so. You cannot show him those photographs. I've put my foot down. That's it. You're not doing it."

Sirius' grin fades to a soft smile. "But these aren't your photographs anymore, Moony. You gave them to me. They're mine. I can do whatever I want with them."

Lupin's nose twitches in repressed fury. "I'm supervising you - censoring you, if necessary."

Sirius scoffs. "Censoring me?"

Lupin frowns deeply. "James isn't here to defend himself. James isn't here to be an example of the man he grew up to be. All I'm asking is that you remember that when you show him these."

"Remus, we were all bastards. I mean, all right, I might make an exception for you, but you had your moments. Don't try to deny it."

"I won't. Harry can still ask me questions, demand explanations from me, and I can still give them to the best of my ability. That's the point you're failing to grasp here."

Sirius rolls his eyes and sighs dramatically. "What do you want me to say then? What's acceptable?"

"You do not mention Snape."

Sirius scowls. "If he's in them-"

"Some. Him, James, and that damned flobberworm - that's in there. That sort of thing is fine, but you have to remember that Snape is still Harry's teacher. You can't belittle him. Besides, what would Harry think?"

Sirius scoffs. "For the love of Christ! He can't stand him, Remus."

Lupin raises his eyebrows pointedly. "And where's he inherited that from?"

"You, Remus. You just as much as me. I know what happened with that boggart."

"You do?"

"Everyone knows. It was fucking hysterical. You expect me to keep a story like that to myself? That's not the point. Point is, you actively encouraged a teenaged boy to conjure up Snape in drag."

Lupin tries not to smile, but a muscle jumps in his jaw and betrays him. Sirius grins.

"Look, you and I both know I'm not concerned about Snape. I'm concerned about James - specifically Harry's opinion of him. You don't know what he's like, Sirius. He hero worships Jim."

"I don't know what he's like? Oh, forgive me, Remus, I thought it was me he had pinned to the floor. I thought he was screaming at me. Obviously, I was mistaken."

"Well, quite. Maybe it's none of my business, but I don't think anyone should shatter his illusions. He's only fifteen. He's a child who ultimately still needs his dad - the man he's imagined his dad to be. So please. Think about how you'd feel if someone showed you your hero's feet of clay when you were fifteen. You left home three days before James was back from France and my father could have left you to sleep in the chicken shed after what you'd just done to me, but he didn't. I know you admired him for it. We all knew. You practically fell over yourself trying to get back into his good books. And you were my friend, I had to forgive you, but if you'd done that to my son, I don't know how I would have killed you, but I can assure you it wouldn't have been an open-casket funeral."

Sirius nods. "I know."

"And when I told you what he'd done to me, even inadvertently, you were mortified."

"Yes, for you."

"Exactly! And why? Because he was there for you. Because you liked him. Because you were familiar with the man he became. Otherwise, you'd have been furious."

Sirius sighs. "All right. You've made your point."

"Thank you."

They fall into an awkward silence while Sirius flicks through the only documentation of seven years of friendship.

"What if the story's particularly hilarious?"

Lupin raises an eyebrow. "Especially if you find it particularly hilarious."

"Don't be such a wet blanket. I think maybe I'll grab him when he comes back before he can skulk off and get like you do."

Lupin makes a face. "What does that mean?"

"Self-absorbed."

Lupin gapes at him.

"Oh, come on. I'm not cursed. I am the curse."

"Sirius, that was at my father's funeral."

"I'll strike it from the record, but the feeling had been there since the day I met you."

"Coincidence?"

"All right, maybe not self-absorbed. Self-pitying then. You are the most self-pitying person I know. And he's getting that way. I just don't want him to come home and shut himself off. It's Christmas. Maybe it'll distract him from Arthur."

Lupin, though marveling at Sirius' hypocrisy, nods his approval.

"Did you mean it - when you said you'd censor me?"

"Of course not. I meant what I said about James, but I wouldn't censor you."

"You couldn't censor me. I meant are you going to stay? Are you going to be here when I talk about them?"

Lupin smiles sadly. "If you want me to be. Where would I go?"

"I don't know whether or not I'm anticipating it."

"If that's got anything to do with my talk of burning and defacing and whiskey, I'll admit that most of that was in a fit of self-pity."

Sirius laughs genuinely for the first time in months. "I knew it."