WARNING: This is a slash story, which means it contains male/male erotic content involving consenting adults. If you're not of legal age or are offended by such material, please go find something else to read.

Title: Side Effects
Author: Mimi
Email: mimine101@hotmail.com
Pairing: SS/SB/RL
Category: DramaAngst
Rating: NC-17
Summary: Sirius tries to come to terms with his unusual relationship with Remus and Severus.
Disclaimers: I don't own them. She does. She's rich. I'm not. I'm not making any profit off them. Suing me would be pointless and a very mean thing to do.

It was an awkward arrangement at first. We didn't want to make Remus choose. We both loved him too much for that. Both of us, I had to admit after I'd screamed until I was blue in the face that Snape had no more capacity to love than a pillar of ice. The truth was there. We fought together during the war. We suffered. Eventually we shared the same bed after Remus had had enough of sneaking around. He couldn't choose. It was impossible.

We wouldn't touch each other at first. We were both with Remus, pleasuring him, getting pleasure. At first it bothered me a little, I'll admit it. Those beady black eyes on me as I would prepare Remus then enter him and take him in long strokes. Passion burning in those dark eyes. Until I realised that I needed those eyes. I needed an audience to make love to Remus.

Yes, it bothered me at first. Seeing Severus lying under my friend. Wrapping his long legs around Remus' back. Was that the attraction, I wondered. That unlike me, Severus was so willing to play the passive role? The reserved Slytherin moaning with wild abandon shattered all of my preconceptions. Contradicted all the names I'd called him to Remus, cold, domineering, cruel, unfeelingÉ

Sometimes I blamed Remus for putting me in this situation. For forgiving our Death Eater friend who had betrayed to the entire school that he was a werewolf. A teacher can be many things in Hogwarts, even a ghost, a gay former Death Eater, but a werewolf? It had been difficult for Remus to be accepted back but his status of war hero had put him in his element again. Teaching.

Remus would just shrug and explain to me that all this is in the past. He has resolved it with Severus. His voice would carry a faint note of accusation urging me to understand Severus, forgive and forget. Or rather ask his forgiveness for what happened in the Shrieking Shack all these years ago. Ask Severus' forgiveness. I know Remus forgave me eons ago. And Remus knows that Muggles will be skiing in hell before I ask Severus to forgive me.

So delicate, our Remus. Severus treats him as if he's made of glass. Sees that he takes his potion. Discourages him from working late. Doesn't deny him anything. I hadn't expected him to accept our peculiar sleeping arrangement, both on Remus' king-size bed, within easy reach.

At first I'd been unwilling to sleep on the same bed as Snape. Making love had been one thing but the mere thought of him being right next to Remus just as I was, bothered me to no end. The Slytherin must have shared my sentiments. Sleeping felt almost more intimate than making love.

But Remus is hard to resist. Ant there was no way I was going to let that slimy git have him all to himself.

And that's how it started, I suppose. Unlike Remus who sleeps like a log, Severus is a light sleeper. And when I would wake up with a near scream, shivering and whimpering like a puppy just as a Dementor was about to lock lips with mine, Remus would stir perhaps but that was it.

The other man would hear me though. And I would hear the change in his breathing. I'd prick my ears and tell it apart from Remus' light snore.

It was around four months ago, I think. I was lying on my face as I always sleep, trying to regulate my breathing and kill any sound before it left my throat. The nightmare had been particularly nasty. I'd broken into a cold sweat and shivered violently. I felt fingers in my hair, then lower, on the nape of my neck. I sensed that the man had knelt on the side of the bed, right next to me. I felt his warm breath against my ear as he made reassuring sounds. Not quite words but I was in a place that did not require words.

He took me out of that place. He covered my shivering body like a warm, breathing blanket. I enjoyed the weight of his slight form on top of me. Shielding me. Protecting me. I held on to him and thenÉ

I like to think that it had been solely his doing. But I sent all the right signals. I showed him exactly what I wanted. He was nearly naked, as I was. I gathered my knees to my chest and spread them. My movement surprised even me since I'm generally very unwilling to be passive.

No words were spoken. I did not turn to see his face.

It was an explosion of pleasure-pain, more on the pleasure side. Raw. Real. Unlike anything I had ever experienced. Because with RemusÉ I'll be honest here. It hurt. I knew he would do his best to get me to relaxÉ accept, but my body's rebellion would not subside. He would have to be so careful that eventually I guess he felt it wasn't worth the trouble. I still insisted and we did it sometimes but I guess he was getting what he needed from Snape.

As I had, that night. Under him. Coming after a few strokes of his skilful fingers. Hearing his moans against my ear.

It became almost a pattern. I tried to conceal the state the nightmare had left me in but he almost always knew. And I accepted his slender body on top of mine. Indulged that passive streak I hadn't really known I had.

Sometimes Remus would wake up and join us. I think he was happy to see us together. There was this time when we sandwiched Severus between us. They're both thin but their combined weight had nearly smothered me. I'd felt as though I had Hagrid on top of me.

There. I resort to humour. It is a difficult story to tell. And as I commit the words to parchment I know I need to be honest. Blunt even. It is to myself that I'm writing this. To straighten out my feelings. To understand who I am and what I want.

I want to return the favour. To offer him some solace. I'm not the only one who gets bad dreams. Remus has asked him to wake him up whenever he gets one of those nightmares. Severus had scared him, you see. Before we took to sharing the same bed, all three of us, Severus had sleepwalked one night. He hadn't gone very far but he'd had a knife when Remus found him. My werewolf friend had of course been afraid that his lover would hurt himself. I don't know what Severus had feared. He had refused to discuss the incident.

It happened once. Strangled cries the mattress bouncing. I'd thought at first that Remus and him were indulging in an after hours lovemaking session. But Remus' steady breathing in my ear told me otherwise.

I went to him. He had curled into a foetal ball, eyes tightly shut, his breathing coming out in raspy gasps.

"Please, help him!" His eyes opened, glassy, burning, looking right at me but not really seeing me.

"It's ok, Severus."

"Harry, they got HarryÉ"

I approached slowly placing a hesitant hand on his cheek.

"He's fine. You got us there in time."

He did not relax. I did not need this nighttime confession to know that he cares about my godson. He still sneers at him and calls him a brat though he isn't so quick to deduct House points, not with two Gryffindors sharing a bed with him. Harry doesn't let him get to him. On the contrary. He treats him with a complacency that infuriates our Slytherin. Although I will admit that being with Remus who has an unbelievable gift for teaching has positively influenced Snape from what I've gathered from Harry and other students. Not to the point of becoming anyone's favourite teacher but he's not the ogre he was before.

I wonder if the children guess what their Potions master, their DADA master and that "oh so yummy, even though he's a bit old" Quidditch coach are up to. Dumbledore has refused to acknowledge what is there. He's asked us, however, to be discreet. Which we are.

I'm stalling. I had gotten to the night Severus' anguished moans had woken me up. I whispered soothing words to him. He calmed down slowly. Sex had worked for me and I thoughtÉ He accepted my kiss. My bitter, sleepy kiss. I moved lower but he was unresponsive. Even when I took him in my mouth he remained flaccid.

Sex would have been easier, I think. But Severus Snape is not an easy man.

I pushed a most pliable Remus to my side of the bed. In his defence, it was the night after the full moon and he was dead tired. Not to mention that I don't believe for a second that the wolfsbane really doesn't have any side effects as the two of them are trying to convince me.

I took Severus in my arms. He was trembling like a leaf. I kissed away the tears standing in the corners of his eyes. He pressed his wet face against my bare chest.

I wonder if Remus knows I feel different. Whether he suspects what Severus has done to me. All he's definitely seen is that we now accept each other sexually. Which makes us very creative in bed. Which is great. I've never been particularly inhibited. And life is short.

And yet, bed is one thing. What do I do the rest of the day? To my dismay I realise that I try to spend as much time as possible with Snape. Hoping thatÉ what?

He pretends not to take any notice of me. I sit in a corner in a nonchalant and innately graceful, if I may say so, stance, in the Muggle clothing that he disapproves of even though I know he too wears jeans occasionally. Chin resting on my hand, my elbow on my knee as he slices and dices and stirs and does exactly what he discourages Remus from doing. He works. For hours and hours. Remus remembers him most of the time and brings him food and drink. I'm not that domestic. Yet, my mind sneers at me.

I look at his long-fingered hands. They hypnotise me with their deft movements. He pays absolutely no attention to me. I look at myself to make sure I haven't turned into a dog. A dull pain twists and turns in my insides.

I battle with my pride whenever I pass the half open door to his laboratory. But I almost always slip in and sit and stare at him, pathetic sod that I am.

Jealousy flares in my chest whenever I see them alone with each other. They sit by the fireplace and talk for hours over academic subjects and such, passion burning in their eyes as they get into mind-numbing details like a couple of Ravenclaws.

Sometimes I'm in the room with them but it makes no difference. Following their conversation becomes an exercise in futility. I even read up on subjects they are likely to touch but by the time they resume a conversation on anything I've managed to familiarise myself with in the meantime, my contribution is rather meagre and soon enough they move on to something new. And I'm left behind wondering whether maybe the Dementors have sucked all the knowledge I'd ever possessed out of my brain.

Even now that middle age has set upon me I'm pleasant to look at. I don't gather that only from the hormonally charged teenagers I coach. A trip to Hogsmeade proves that I can still turn heads. And not just because I was a wanted man for so long.

But like an aging diva I realise that my looks are all I really have. When I lose them those two will still have a fireplace and the conversation I can't take part in.

I was trying to explain all that to Severus the other night. Luckily for me, the amount of alcohol in my bloodstream had hampered communications between my brain and my mouth. I doubt that my drunken warbling had made much sense.

I know he smelt her cheap perfume on me. I saw the disapproval in his eyes. And he said something about me hurting Remus. Not him. How could I hurt Severus Snape? But Remus needs to be protected, of course. I realise that. And I started to cry, I think. Why do I have to remember anything at all?

He half-carried me to the bathroom and held back my hair as I emptied the contents of my stomach. He turned and softly told Remus to get back to bed, he had an early class tomorrow. He'd get me cleaned up and in bed in no time. Remus argued but ultimately did as the Slytherin had asked.

"I only smell her perfume," muttered Severus. "Who knows what he'd pick up."

Even I could smell stale sex on me. We hadn't gotten as far as her apartment. The last time I'd been with a woman had been before Azkaban. The nameless encounter in the alley outside the club told me I hadn't been missing much.

I laughed and Severus hissed at me to be quiet. I heard running water. He struggled with my tight pants which I graciously helped him remove. He continued undressing me, his fingers burning my skin whenever they brushed against it. Simply brushed against it. He didn't touch me more than he would have to, sighing as if he was dealing with a difficult child.

Thus, he bathed me. Ignoring my arousal. Grunting. And I told myself that maybe my infidelity had hurt him too and it wasn't all about washing the female smell off me to spare his precious Remus.

When did Remus become the side effect in our three-way relationship? My words are harsh and seeing them written down scares me. It's not that I don't love Remus. How could I not love him? What's not to love? Loving him is easy. Loving him doesn't hurt me. It's not likeÉ whatever it is with Snape.

I've given him the power to hurt me. I doubt that I can hurt him back. So I can only pray he will not realise he has that power over me. But cunning Slytherin that he is, I think he already knows.