Archive of Our Own ^beta

The blast of cold air startles Remus as his son, Teddy, opens the door to his beat up sedan.

“Hiya, Da,” he says cheerily, hazel eyes bright and cheeks slightly flushed.

“‘Lo, Teddy,” Remus answers, shoving his laptop into his bag and sliding it into the backseat. He’d arrived at the little comic shop a few minutes early and decided it was as good a time as ever to send off next quarter’s detailed rubric to Minerva, the stern but brilliant Deputy Head of School.

As Remus pulls out of the tiny parking lot, Teddy wastes no time in launching into an incredibly detailed explanation of his evening. It takes some effort for Remus to switch his mindset from the minutiae of aligning his lessons with GCSE standards to the sweeping tale of adventure that Teddy is now spinning for him, but he nods along as best he can until his mind catches up to Teddy’s.

“…so after we introduced ourselves as our characters, Sirius explains that there’s a reward out if we capture this dwarf that’s missing…” Remus has heard the name Sirius frequently over the past couple of months, and he imagines it’s only going to get worse now that they’re running the Dungeons and Dragons…meeting? Game? Session? Whatever you call it? That Teddy has joined. Frankly, names are coming at him a little too fast, and he only vaguely recognizes them from school, or Teddy. Sirius. Neville. Cho. Fred and George, whose names are always spoken in a single breath as if they are one entity, FredandGeorge.

“…and then Neville casts ‘charm person’ on the bugbear and suddenly this big, scary, giant dude named Hagrid is calling himself Rubeus and inviting us over for tea…” Teddy is saying as Remus manages to find a parking spot decently close to the little flat they share. Teddy continues to chatter all the way until they reach the front door, and Remus gives up on trying to keep track of every little thing in favor of appreciating his son. He’s all teenager by now, a few months out from sixteen, long limbed and pimply and a little too concerned with being “cool” sometimes. But it’s moments like this where the excited little boy peeks through, in the words that tumble out of him so quickly that there are hardly spaces between them and in the wonder that dances in his eyes, clearly seeing something beyond the comparatively drab world that surrounds them.

See, Lupins are masters of escapism. Remus’s own father had been criminally good at it, diving into his government work so deeply that he escaped the burden of developing a meaningful relationship with his chronically ill child. Remus’s brand of escapism is words, both read and written, probably partially due to the silence that emptied their little home growing up and Remus’s desire to fill it in some grand way. And now, Remus’s son, who does an excellent job filling every silence he comes across, instead escapes in his art. Somehow Teddy looks around at the generic beige of the cheap flat and fills his mind with color and shape and pattern, and from there puts those images onto canvas after canvas, page after page. Indeed, in the few months they have lived in this little flat, Teddy has already managed to cover an entire wall in their living room in paintings. As much as he loves the individual pieces, It’s rather migraine-inducing to look at all together like that, but he can’t tell his son no, not when so much of the flat’s bare surfaces are covered in Remus’s books. Teddy lets his dad have his words, and Remus lets his son have his pictures, and they work around each other accordingly.

Remus and Teddy sit on the couch, each with a bowl of microwaved leftovers. They have a little counter in the kitchen that could work well as an eating surface, but Teddy inherited Remus’s penchant for perching rather than sitting, and they both find the couch more comfortable anyways. They are at opposite ends, backs to the armrests and socked feet tucked under their bodies, facing each other. Nights with Remus and Teddy don’t always sound the same: sometimes they are filled with casual chit-chat, sometimes they are filled with Stern Life Lessons, sometimes they are nothing but the soft sound of the record player in the background. But always, always they look like this: father and son mirroring each other on the couch, crunched legs and bad posture.

“So you had fun, then?” Remus asks, a teasing smile on his face. Teddy answers genuinely, because that’s how happy he is.

“I had so much fun.” He emphasizes each of the last three words with a little head bob, as if trying to set the words on the couch cushion between them just to admire them a bit. “I was a little nervous at first, because it felt sort of silly to pretend to be some fantasy character, but then FredandGeorge introduced themselves with these ridiculous voices and everyone just burst out laughing because they were awful, like really terrible, and I figured I couldn’t do anything worse than that.”

Remus laughs a little with Teddy, feeling warm and happy for his son. Teddy doesn't really have friends, at least any serious ones. Their recent move certainly didn’t help, but Teddy’s never been great at maintaining friendships, probably because many people find his talkative nature and forgetfulness and intense hyperfixations a bit off putting. When Teddy was in A Phase (as Remus tended to call them), nothing but the subject of The Phase could hold his attention. Sometimes, deep in the throes of his fixation, things ignored included food and sleep and other people. It’s rather hard to maintain a friendship when sleep deprived, hungry, and consistently showing up late, or not at all, to planned hangouts. Remus remembers Teddy’s mother, Nym, being the same way, and remembers how much she fretted over it, how much she craved close friends and only ever found Remus, and tries his best to be patient and understanding, even when he wants to pull his hair out because if he has to dump out one more mug of cold, oversteeped tea…

“Plus, Sirius made me feel super comfortable, and I think they made everyone else feel comfortable too. You just can’t feel embarrassed around him because he’s so…” he pauses to take a bite and contemplate which word he wants to use, “dramatic. Like, truly nothing could be more embarrassing than her and yet she clearly doesn't give a shit.”

“And Sirius is the…Diem?” Teddy rolls his eyes, pure teenager.

“D, M,” he answers, with lengthy pauses between the letters. “Dungeon Master.”

“So they’re the storyteller, in a way?” Teddy nods enthusiastically.

“Yes, but it’s so much more than that! They tell us what happens but she also plays every character that isn’t one of the party members, and he controls every enemy we fight, and he comes up with all these names and places. And they use different voices for every character, and sometimes when they’re really excited about something they’ll even stand up because they’re so into what they’re saying. And she’s so bloody cool, she has this long hair, and this leather jacket, and they drive a motorbike, Da. A motorbike.” Remus doesn’t want to admit how cool Sirius actually sounds, on top of being impressed by the sheer amount of work they probably put into this DMing thing, so he opts to be an annoying Dad instead.

“Oh, am I not cool enough for you, Teddy Bear?” Teddy groans and throws his head back.

“Sorry I don’t find grandpa jumpers and classic lit cool.”

“But what about the vinyl collection? My incredible bass playing skills? My novel I’ll definitely finish?”

“Oh, I almost forgot, you’re a hipster with an unfinished novel, the coolest and most unique person to ever exist.” Teddy stands from the couch then, reaching for Remus’s bowl and heading over to the kitchen.

Remus watches his son wash up from dinner and wonders how he got so damn lucky, as cliche as that sounds. Sure, his only friend, Teddy’s mum, passed away a few years ago, and he never really made any new friends after that, and he can barely make ends meet on his teacher salary, and his body is always in pain for one reason or another, but when he looks at his son, he’s happy. Teddy is lanky and sarcastic and talkative and changes his hair color on a monthly basis at least and he’s Remus’s. His boy.

“Can we go shopping this weekend?” Teddy asks as he dries his hands. “I’m low on canvas.” Shopping for them really just means hitting up their favorite secondhand shops, where Teddy picks out the ugliest paintings he can find to paint over and Remus combs over the bookshelves. Remus knows that normally a fifteen-year-old kid should have friends his own age to do that sort of thing with, but he can’t help but be grateful for the time he gets to spend with his son.

“Only if we hit up the record store, too.” Teddy grins back at Remus, a mischievous glint in his eye.

“You know the rules, Da,” he says. “If you get to go to Holyhead, I get to go to Marauder’s.” Now it’s Remus’s turn to groan, but he doesn’t mean it, really. Teddy has only been going to the shop for a couple months now, but he lights up with joy every time he approaches it and the bench out front is a lovely spot to sit and read for a bit.

Teddy doesn’t wait for confirmation, only says a quick thanks-love-you before bounding off into his bedroom. Remus sighs as he opens his budget, and moves his money around so he can give as much of the world to Teddy as he can manage.

**

Remus doesn’t look up when he hears someone plop into a desk in his classroom, but he does when they speak.

“Hi, Moony.” Harry’s voice is flat and dejected, none of his usual spark. Remus looks up to see him staring blankly at his unopened lunchbox. Usually he’s joined by a gaggle of friends, always Ron and Hermione and usually a few more queer students he’s invited along. It’s a little odd to see him alone.

“I take it you’re having lunch with me today?”

Harry shrugs. “‘S Friday,” is his answer. A truly ringing endorsement. And it’s true, Harry usually joins Remus for lunch a couple days a week, and always on Fridays, when students have a bit more freedom as to where they spend their lunch period. Remus doesn’t really understand why a fourteen year old kid would want to spend his lunch period with his thirty-six year old lit teacher, even if his friends tag along. Still, Harry and his friends always show up, and always seem happy to be there, somehow. Today is just Harry though, and Remus thinks he looks a bit sad and dejected, sitting there like that.

“You don’t have to spend lunch with me, Harry,” Remus says to Harry’s forehead, which is what’s facing him at the moment. The scar that arcs across his face is a bit more pronounced like this, the soft light of the lamps and fairy lights that Remus has filled his classroom with casting odd shadows. “If you’d prefer to eat with your friends, go eat with your friends.”

“No,” Harry says suddenly, looking up with concern. “I want to eat here, I love eating here!”

“Well alright then,” Remus says, shoving his papers to the side and getting out his own lunch from his bag. He doesn’t say anything more, and Harry stares back at his lunchbox, still unopened. Remus can tell Harry is upset from his forlorn attitude alone, but the loss of appetite is the biggest indicator that he’s stewing over something. Still, Remus knows he doesn’t need to push. Harry will sit quietly for a bit and then come out and say, rather bluntly, exactly what it is that’s bothering him. Still, when he selects some music for them to listen to, he picks Radiohead. Not his favorite, but Harry loves them, and he can’t help but try to cheer the boy up a little.

Sure enough, just as the opening chords of “How Do You” begin to play out of Remus’s little Bluetooth speaker, Harry sighs and looks directly at Remus with those startling green eyes of his.

“I think Malfoy is queer.”

Remus has to very consciously control his face because this is somehow both completely surprising and exactly what he expected. Even though this is his first year at this school, Remus picked up on Harry and Draco’s complicated history almost immediately, both from the gossipy teachers that like to hang out in the lounge and from the intense glares they shoot each other across the room throughout his class periods. The two can’t stand each other and yet can’t stay away from each other at the same time.

“Did he tell you that he is?” Harry snorts at this, as if Remus were being utterly ridiculous, which, yea, he probably was.

“Yea, because Malfoy and I are such good friends and talk all the time.” Remus ignores the sarcasm.

“Well, if he didn’t tell you, then how do you know?” Harry blushes at this slightly.

“I…happened to overhear him having a conversation the other day. With Zabini.” Remus gives Harry the best Teacher Look he can muster, one that conveys an appropriate level of healthy disbelief and stern disappointment. Harry averts his eyes again, blush deepening.

“Completely accidental,” Harry mumbles. Remus knows he should probably give a lecture, but honestly Harry looks like he feels guilty enough and, for all of the complexities of Draco and Harry’s relationship, he probably didn’t mean any harm by it. Also, Remus can’t help but be a bit curious.

“And did the topic of his sexuality come up in this accidentally overheard conversation?” Remus asks, hoping Harry takes the hint that Remus is not about to lecture him for snooping.

“Well, sort of,” he says to his lunchbox, his eyebrows coming together to create a sort of puzzled expression. “Zabini said something about a crush, and Malfoy said something about how it doesn’t matter because it’s never going to happen anyways. And then someone coughed and I couldn’t quite catch what Zabini said, but I’m sure he used the pronoun he.” Harry looks up at Remus then, a defensive edge to his tone, as if he has argued this point already multiple times and isn’t in the mood to do so again. Remus nods reassuringly, and Harry seems to ease up a little, but only a little.

“That’s when Malfoy mentioned his family and, well, that’s really why I’m bringing it up.” Remus sees a look grow in Harry’s eyes, one that he is growing increasingly familiar with. He’s seen it many times throughout the semester, especially when the well-being of a fellow student is in question. His eyes seem to glow, and a fierce edge enters his voice, and if he ever starts breathing fire in those moments Remus will not be surprised at all.

“If he is queer,” Harry continues, “there’s no way his family would support him. I know they wouldn’t, Pads told me what they’re like.” Pads is Harry’s godfather, who’s been raising him since Harry’s parents were murdered when he was very young. Harry talks about Pads and their guitar and their dog and their motorbike almost every lunch period he spends with Remus. They seem incredibly close, adorably so, even with the tragedy of his parents’ deaths hanging over the arrangement.

“Would you like me to keep an eye on Draco, then?” Harry seems to release, a tension in his shoulders suddenly melting away.

“Yes, please,” he says. “I know he’s a git but no one deserves homophobic parents, do they?” Remus gives Harry another Look at his word choice, but doesn’t say anything else. There are more important things than language to discuss at this moment, and Remus really doesn’t care either way.

“No,” he says instead. “No one deserves that.”

Harry brightens considerably and finally opens his lunchbox and begins chatting about his most recent football practice for the rec league he’s in, how excited he is for the upcoming match against their rivals, the Snakes. Draco, of course, plays for them, and all concern for his well being is now forgotten in favor of hoping that he cries when the Lions (Harry’s team) beat him. Now Remus does admonish Harry, albeit a little playfully.

“But Mooooonnyyyyy,” Harry whines, making Remus chuckle. The nickname is silly, one that the students managed to come up with after only two class periods. It has something to do with the calendar he uses, one which organizes itself by the lunar cycle rather than the traditional calendar months, but also something to do with his namesake being raised by wolves. Remus knows he probably isn’t supposed to let his students call him by a nickname, but he truly hates being called “Mr. Lupin,” and Moony is much better than “Wolf Wolf,” which is what the students at his previous school had favored.

Remus is glad to see that Harry is in a better mood by the time the bell rings at the end of lunch period, and he gives a cheery wave as he leaves, throwing back one last reminder about keeping his eye out.

Watching out for a queer student isn’t such an unusual request from the boy. On the students’ very first day of school that term, Harry had invited himself into Remus’s room during lunch, plopped himself down at a desk, and started complaining about how the boy he had been talking to all summer was ignoring him now that they were back at school and then asked Remus for advice. Remus, somewhat thrown, gave it willingly, saying something about how if he was out to his friends and his family but still wanted to keep Harry a secret then it probably wasn’t healthy to keep the relationship up. Harry had nodded then, a look in his eyes that Remus now knows is the one he gives when he’s sizing someone up. Harry then straight up asked Remus if a boy had ever wanted to keep him a secret, to which Remus had spluttered and stumbled for a moment before finally asking how Harry knew he was queer.

“You’re the lit teacher,” Harry had said, as if that were the only explanation he needed.

It wasn’t long before Harry was bringing up other students he knew or suspected were queer, especially those that he suspected did not have support at home. Remus started keeping a closer eye on them, even had a couple private chats with those that he suspected were having a particularly rough time. Now there’s a whole group of them that regularly come with Harry for one of his “Moony Lunches,” forming the kind of queer community that Remus wishes he’d had at that age.

Remus didn’t exactly plan on being The Queer Teacher when he was initially hired. Hogwarts pays a lot of lip service to diversity and inclusion, but so did his previous school, and Remus is long disillusioned. He doesn’t believe a school is truly inclusive until he sees it for himself, and he does his best to keep a low profile until then. He was definitely wary of Hogwarts when he began, exacerbated by the Head of School that gives him the creeps. He now feels fairly comfortable being openly bisexual, especially after he learned that Minerva is married to the school nurse, also a woman. But really, he was okay with being out before he knew that, because he just can’t say no to Harry.

As Remus begins setting up for his next lesson, he marvels at Harry’s big heartedness, the way he cares so deeply about others. Even though he’s a bit of a troublemaker, there always seems to be some noble reason for the trouble. Yes, Harry punched Marcus Flint in the face, but Flint had just called one of Harry’s best friends a slur. Yes, Harry broke a stall door in the girl’s bathroom, but he heard a girl crying in there and was worried she was in serious trouble. Yes, Harry smuggled a snake out of the biology classroom, but the thing was clearly being underfed by the slightly-insane biology teacher and by all accounts (all being Harry and his friends Ron and Hermione) Norbert is now living in the grandest snake enclosure ever seen in the United Kingdom. And always, Harry waves off any praise or criticism for these actions in equal measure, assured that, regardless of any rules broken, he’d done the thing that was right.

Of course, it’s a lot easier for Harry to come to Remus about the problems of others than it is for him to open up about the problems he really struggles with. Harry had been eating lunch with Remus for weeks, discussing things like biphobia and crushes openly and honestly, when he one day burst into tears over his uneaten rice bowl. It took some work, but Remus managed to decipher that Harry was feeling dysphoric because he was on his period, and it was a particularly uncomfortable one on top of that. Remus offered his support as best he could, pointing out the stash of products he kept in his room for his menstruating students, and overall thought he had only done an okay job. Still, before Harry left at the end of the lunch period, he surprised Remus by asking for a hug, and then whispering his thanks ever so quietly into Remus’s jumper.

Really, Remus believes Harry is a wonder, especially considering what Harry has gone through. Remus wishes Harry himself could have told him about his parents, their brutal murders when Harry was only a toddler. Instead it was one of the first things Minerva told him when she saw Harry on his roster, a conversation she prefaced with, “everyone else knows already, it was all over the papers.” Remus was expecting a bitter, resentful, or angry child, and was shocked when he met the boy with the big heart and mischievous spirit. He suspects Harry is shockingly well adjusted because of his godfather. They seem endlessly supportive and incredibly honest with their godson, and her parenting has paid dividends in Remus’s opinion. He knows he isn’t supposed to have favorites as a teacher, but he does anyways, and Harry is probably top of the list.

So Remus will keep an eye on Draco, as well as the other queer kids at Hogwarts, and wonders if he’s even half as good a parent to Teddy as Harry’s godparent is to him.

**

Saturday rolls around, dreary and cold. Remus’s hip is already tight and stiff, and his lungs will feel horrendous in the sharp air, and he knows the responsible thing to do for his own body would be to cancel his and Teddy’s shopping day. But he knows Teddy is looking forward to it, and frankly Remus is too, so he hauls himself out of bed and joins his already chipper son in the kitchen.

Teddy is much too awake for this hour of the morning, already chattering about what he hopes to find at the shops today. It’s one of the few times Remus finds him truly annoying, simply because Remus is not a morning person. But Teddy has also already started the kettle for tea and is warming up the pan for eggs, and Remus knows he’s only like this because he’s looking forward to the day, and so Remus tries to focus on what he’s saying as best he can.

It’s about his DM again, something about how he hopes Sirius is at the shop when they stop there later. He’s bustling about the kitchen, leaving every cabinet door open, but Remus learned long ago to let him tornado his way through breakfast and instead help him clean up afterwards. He’s talking about how Sirius and him had got into a conversation last week about music because Sirius had been singing along to Queen as it played over the shop speakers, and isn’t it just so cool that Sirius is into Queen? When Remus gets glimpses of Teddy’s eyes, he sees stars reflected in them.

They enjoy their breakfast together on the couch as usual, and Remus feels marginally more prepared for the day after a tea. When he emerges from his bedroom, wearing two jumpers, a knit cap, and fingerless gloves, Teddy is presenting him with a travel mug filled with a second cup of tea. Remus can’t even be mad about the box he left on the counter, because what on earth did Remus do to deserve such a sweet boy for a kid?

Remus asks Teddy more questions about his character as they drive to their favorite secondhand store, and Teddy happily explains what exactly a druid is, and how they can turn into a wolf, and how no, Romy, his character, isn’t a werewolf because they can control when they shift, but everyone calls them a werewolf anyways. Remus secretly hopes that Teddy made his character a wolf because of Remus’s whole wolf-name-thing, but he doesn’t say so out loud because as much as he loves his son and is as open with him as he can be, some things are just a little too saccharine to say out loud.

They spend the rest of the morning in their respective corners of the store: Teddy in the back left where all the paintings are, and Remus in the back right amongst the shelves of books. Even when Remus strolls over to Teddy to check on him, the boy is completely silent, eyes furrowed as he flicks through canvas after canvas, deciding which works are ugly enough to warrant painting over. Art is the thing that always gets Teddy to quiet down, his hyperactive mind finding adequate stimulation in the consideration of color and shape and form. Remus leaves him to his canvas, and heads back to the paperbacks.

By the time they leave, Teddy carrying three new canvases and a collection of acrylics he had managed to find, the weather has gone from dreary to ominous. The sky is now more of a gray than a dull white, and the temperature has dropped. There is a slight wind now, and it cuts through Remus’s jumpers like a knife. He feels it in his joints and has to lean on his cane a little more heavily than usual. As he sits in the car, he lets out a little involuntary wheeze, chest tight, and isn’t that just lovely? Not even forty and he can’t even sit down without sounding like a dilapidated old house.

“You know, I don’t really need to go to Marauder’s today. I’ll probably head there after school on Monday anyways.” Teddy is giving him an out, and Remus knows it. He should probably take it, rest in bed and start grading Friday’s quizzes, maybe even work a little on his novel. But he was also incredibly unsuccessful at the thrift shop and is hoping for better luck at Holyhead Records, and he knows Teddy really wants to go to Marauder’s and is just being kind. So Remus pulls out of the lot in the direction of Holyhead, and Teddy can’t help the smile that spreads across his face, and really that makes the whole trip worth it, right there.

Remus smiles when he sees Alice, the owner of Holyhead, behind the register. She greets them by name and chats for a bit, before leaving Remus to his browsing. He hopes that seeing Alice is a good omen, but his bad luck continues, and he and Teddy head back to the door empty handed.

“Nothing catch your eye today, Remus?” Alice calls out from where she sits on the floor. She’s digging through a box that someone has donated, inspecting a record for damage before placing a little price sticker on the cover.

“Not today,” Remus says, hoping his voice doesn’t sound as disappointed as he feels.

“I’m still on the lookout for Ziggy Stardust, by the way. I’m assuming you haven’t found it yet.”

“You’d be the first person to hear about it if I did,” Remus answers, and it’s not that far off from the truth. Remus doesn’t chat with his coworkers about music, doesn’t really talk much with anyone besides his son. Besides, they don’t really get Remus’s thing about vinyl. He once made the mistake of complaining about the sound quality of his Bluetooth speaker, how he wishes it were practical to bring his record player to the classroom. The math teacher, Mrs. Sinistra, had scoffed then and said something about how silly that was, it’s the same music either way, and Remus had felt so put down he hadn’t brought up music again.

“You know, I’m happy to give you a call if I ever come across it, so you can rush over and snatch it before someone else does.” Remus takes a closer look at Alice then. She has a cheery round face, framed by the kind of pitch black hair that can only come from a box. She’s pretty tall when she’s standing, so tall that Remus only has to look down a little to talk with her, and her large frame and dark clothing makes her look pretty intimidating. But when Remus looks in her eyes there is a kind, motherly softness there, the kind that makes him, inexplicably, want to hug her. What he doesn’t see is an ounce of pity or sadness as she offers, the way people usually do when they take in his shabby clothes and scarred face, only earnestness. Huh.

“Um, yea, actually, that’d be really lovely.” He plugs his number into what he realizes is Alice’s personal phone, not a store phone, and as he walks out he feels the vibration of a text.

(unknown): Alice Longbottom, Record Locator Extraordinaire

He laughs as he slides his phone back into his pocket, and Teddy gives him a side eye.

“You gonna text her back?”

“We just left the shop.”

“...so are you?” Now Remus gives Teddy a side eye, and doesn’t answer as they each slide into their respective seats. Teddy is quiet for another moment before he speaks again.

“She’s rather pretty-”

“She’s married. Pretty sure she has a kid too.”

“Maybe they have an open marriage.” Remus slams on the brakes a little too quickly as Teddy says this, making both of their bodies strain against the seatbelts slightly.

“Fuck, Ted. When did you decide to play matchmaker?” Remus uses a red light as an opportunity to glance over at his son, who is staring into his hands with a forlorn expression.

“Just thought you might like some company.” Remus doesn’t really know what to say to that. It’s not Teddy’s job to find Remus a partner, or even a friend. Frankly, Remus would prefer if Teddy spent his energy on trying to find a friend for himself. Besides, he really does love his little life. He loves his students, or most of them anyways, and he loves his quiet evenings reading, and his Saturdays with Teddy, and the bass that he picks up every now and again. But he also can’t deny that those things might be a little nicer if there were someone else there who wasn’t twenty years younger than him. Like how it was before Nym passed.

Remus knows he’s been lonely. Even if Teddy’s mother wasn’t someone he was interested in romantically, they’d been best friends. If he were honest with himself, he’d admit that, for all that he loves his life, he’d love something more in it, more than his students and his books and his bass. Of course, Remus doesn’t make a habit of being honest with himself.

Realistically, Remus knows it isn’t good for him to go through life without any real friends to speak of, that he really should try to make some headway in that department. But up until this point he hadn’t considered that his loneliness could have an impact on his son, and he wants to kick himself for not realizing that sooner. Teddy is the type of kid who would skip a meetup with friends in favor of making sure his father isn’t alone, and, shit, what if he’s done that already? What if Remus has already held him back from putting himself out there? It had taken more encouragement than Remus had thought it would to get Teddy to say yes to the DnD campaign. How much of that is Remus’s fault?

Teddy is still staring down at his hands when the light turns green, and a few raindrops start to tap against the window. They drive in silence for a little longer, before Remus comes to a decision.

“I’ll text her when we get home.” Even though Remus can’t see him, he can feel the way Teddy lights up when he says it.

“As a friend,” Remus emphasizes. Alice is sweet and beautiful in an intimidating sort of way, and not really what Remus is after at the moment. And married. A key detail.

The rain is really coming down when Remus parks in front of Marauder’s, and with how long Teddy will inevitably be inside the little store it will be much too cold for Remus to wait in the car, let alone sit on the little bench by the front door. They huddle underneath an umbrella and hobble to the door as fast as they can, but they still stumble in a bit wet around the edges.

Though the store front is pretty small, the shop stretches back pretty far. It’s all jumbled shelves, haphazard displays, squeaky floors. There are little rotating kiosks filled with colorful dice sets, boxes of collectible figures stacked atop one another, and the entire right wall is floor to ceiling books, which makes Remus swoon a little even though he isn’t really into comics. In the back left corner there’s a few empty tables and shelves of used looking board games. A song Remus doesn’t recognize is playing over the speakers, but it’s some kind of female-led punk number that he’s enjoying immensely already.

Remus watches Teddy deflate a little as he looks over at the register and sees a blonde girl sitting on the counter. Definitely not the dark-haired owner that Teddy had described. She’s clutching the most beautiful guitar that Remus has ever seen, a bright red explorer. Remus is fairly sure it’s a Gibson, which means it’s likely insanely expensive, and yet here it is, in the hands of this woman strumming lazily on the counter of his son’s favorite shop.

“Hey Marlene,” Teddy calls, and Marlene looks up then. She’s got the whole 70s punk look going for her, bleach blonde hair and messy eyeliner. “Sirius in today?”

“Nah,” she answers, placing the guitar in a case that’s lying open beside her. “His kid has football practice. You gonna introduce me to your Da?”

“Marlene, Remus. Remus, Marlene,” Teddy gestures between them, words tumbling over themselves a little. He’s already eyeing a display of dice sets a few feet away. Marlene shakes her head a little and slides off the counter to hold out her hand.

“Nice to meet ya, Remus,” she says as Remus takes it. “Quite the kid you got there.”

“He’s a bit of a menace, isn’t he?” Remus teases, and he knows Teddy is already distracted when he only gives a half-hearted middle finger in response, his other hand spinning the little rack to view more of the multi-colored, multi-sided dice.

“Nah, he’s lovely,” she says. “Always love seeing that blue hair walk through those doors.”

“You work here a lot?” Remus asks. Teddy has never mentioned anyone other than Sirius, but he supposes it makes sense that they don’t watch the shop entirely on their own, especially if they have a kid. At this thought, his eyes drop automatically to Marlene’s left hand, and there are many rings there, but none of them wedding bands.

“Fairly regularly, yea,” she offers, turning back to give Remus a once over, as if assessing him somehow. “I fill in whenever Sirius needs the help.”

“That’s kind of you,” Remus offers, but Marlene shrugs.

“Gotta watch out for my bandmate, don’t I?” Remus’s eyes automatically slid back to the case on the counter, still lying open. He can’t resist asking anymore.

“I hate to pry, but is that a Gibson?” Marlene beams, then, turning to put the open case between them so Remus can look at it.

“70’s Explorer, yea.” Remus can’t stop his mouth from dropping open. He’s never seen one in person before, and he’s fairly sure that they cost over two thousand pounds. Marlene looks at it like it’s the center of her universe, and yea, Remus can’t help but agree.

“It’s bloody gorgeous,” is all he can say.

“You play?”

“Bass.”

“Really?” she asks, a new interest lighting up her features. “Any good?”

Remus is about to answer and give a firm no, because he only pulls his beat up Epiphone out a couple of times per week at most, so he’s not really improving anything, just maintaining his skills at this point. Of course, he doesn’t have a chance to say any of this because Teddy is paying more attention than Remus thought.

“He’s brill,” he says, that lovely smile sweeping over his face, and Remus feels his ears grow warm from embarrassment.

“I barely play-” he tries to say, but Teddy is walking towards them, talking over him.

“He’s so impressive. I’ve seen him play ‘Anesthesia,’ and he played it well.” Remus knows his blush is growing now, but he can’t help it, because he really is proud of his ability to play that one. Marlene gives a low whistle, eyebrows raised, clearly impressed.

“Well, we do happen to be in need of a bassist…” but Remus is already shaking his head. He will gladly get up in front of a room full of teenagers and talk about classic literature but he hasn’t played bass publicly since…well since Nym died, if he thinks about it.

“Alright, alright,” she continues, hands raised slightly. “No pressure. But, if you just wanted some people to play with, no expectations or anything, we’re an inviting group.” Remus hates how tempting the offer is, and he finds himself inputting his number into a woman’s phone for the second time that day, “just in case.” She smiles when she looks at his contact.

“Remus Lupin, cute name,” and then looks up and winks at Remus. “Perfect for a cute guy.” And oh god, Remus cannot be getting hit on right now, in front of his fucking son. Especially when Marlene, while gorgeous, is still somehow not his type. Teddy reads Remus like a book, though, and saves him from inevitable embarrassment.

“Shame you’re a lesbian, you’d be a sick stepmum.” Marlene gives him a playful swat on the back of his head, which has Teddy ducking and grinning and moving out of arm’s reach.

“I’m an even better Hot Lesbian Aunt, and don’t you forget it,” she bites back, but she’s smiling too. Remus feels himself relax. She’s flirting for fun, not for real. She starts chatting with the both of them, then, asking Teddy how school is going and asking Remus about teaching. Normally talking with people doesn’t feel quite so natural, but Marlene has a charm to her that’s as invigorating as it is easy. Having Teddy around helps, as he is surprisingly adept at covering for Remus’s awkwardness. However, it doesn’t take long for him to start floating away, towards a shelf filled with small, gray plastic characters.

“Oh, that reminds me,” Marlene announces, suddenly. “You’re one of Sirius’s DnD kids, aren’t you?” Teddy nods, curiously. “Pick out a minifig for your character.”

“Oh, it’s fine,” Teddy starts saying automatically. “I can just use the tokens.”

“No, Sirius specifically said that you all need minifigs, no charge.” Teddy’s eyes widen a bit.

“You sure?”

“Positive.”

Suddenly Teddy’s hand is in Remus’s, dragging him over to the little display he’d been eyeing, and he starts pulling different figures off the shelf, comparing their designs. Remus offers input where he can, but he’s pretty sure he’s just over there as an extra set of hands, holding up the different figurines so Teddy can inspect them side by side. He settles on that shows a tall, thin man, leaned over slightly so that he’s partially resting on a wolf seated at his side.

“And you’re sure I don’t have to pay?”

“If I let you pay, Sirius would never forgive me, and don’t tell them this but I quite like them and would be sad without her annoying arse in my life, yea?” Teddy chuckles and Marlene hands him a bag to put his figurine in.

“You know, FredandGeorge,” she says their names without pausing like Teddy does, “are coming by on Tuesday after school to paint theirs. You’re welcome to come along if you’re free.” Teddy looks to Remus, wide eyed and hopeful. Remus also catches the hint of apprehension, but an afternoon painting with friends after school would be so good for him.

“Just text me when you’re finished and I’ll come get you.” Teddy beams then, in a way that takes Remus’s breath away. He’d do anything to make Teddy smile like that, anything at all.

“Great. Invite the others, too, yea? Make it a party.” Teddy pulls out his phone, probably to text the other kids right then and there, and he spends the car drive home texting and laughing into his phone. He apparently made a group chat that has already descended into chaos, based on the startled laughs and “oh my gods” that he is making. Remus can’t help but feel a softness at the sight.

As fun as their excursion has been, Remus can tell it has caught up with his body. He offers his wallet to Teddy without a word, and he heads off to the Chinese takeout spot around the corner from their flat. Remus makes it up the stairs very slowly, lungs burning, and settles into the couch with a groan. It’s then that he realizes that he hasn’t grabbed his work bag with the quizzes, and the book he wants to read is by his bed. Teddy won’t be back for another twenty minutes, and the last thing Remus is going to do right now is move, so he opts for his phone instead.

Two texts greet him, blocking the photo of him and Teddy at the Ghost concert they went to that summer.

(Unknown): marlene <3

(Unknown): Alice Longbottom, Record Locator Extraordinaire

He remembers his promise to Teddy, says fuck it, and opens the conversation with Alice.

Remus: i want you to know that i’ve named you Record Locator Extraordinaire in my contacts

He then creates the contact, but finds it annoying to have that long of a contact name at the top of his phone screen, so shortens it to Alice RLE. He ignores the nervous pit in his stomach as he scrolls mindlessly, until his phone vibrating makes him jump.

Alice RLE: Rather obnoxious to have such a long name, wouldn’t you say?

Remus: in all honesty i shortened it to RLE
Remus: cba to type it all in

Alice RLE: But RLE could stand for anything! Rather Long Epitaph

Remus: Really Loud Environment

Alice RLE: Red Leather Envelope

Remus: Reasonably Lengthed Essay

Alice RLE: Is that the typical length of the essays your students submit?

Remus: generally a bit less than reasonable, save one or two

Alice RLE: You know, I’d expect a lit teacher to text with better grammar than that.

Remus: my son bullies me incessantly

Alice RLE: Teddy? That sweetheart? Never :)

Remus is chuckling to himself when Teddy opens the door, the delicious smell of lo mein wafting through the door. Teddy plops the bag onto the coffee table, eyebrow raised at his father, though he says nothing yet.

Remus: he really is a sweetheart, just came in with chinese takeout

Alice RLE: In that case, I’ll leave you to your Really Large Eggrolls.

Remus sends a laughing emoji and closes his phone and looks up to find Teddy giving him a Look.

“Shut up,” he says, sitting up and reaching for the lo mein. Teddy says nothing and smiles around his chopsticks.

**

Remus is still feeling a bit rough on Sunday, and spends the day lounging about the flat, grading those quizzes. He finishes about midday and feels the urge to pull out his bass. He’s going to opt to plug his bass into his laptop and use headphones, but like a moth to a flame, Teddy is out in the living room, a half finished canvas and palate with him. Teddy loves listening to Remus play the bass, has ever since he was little. So Remus plugs in to his amp, keeping the volume respectful, and spends the rest of the afternoon playing a few of his favorites, and a couple of Teddy’s too. He even sings along, just for the joy of it.

Remus doesn’t see Teddy pull out his phone and film for a bit, but he does see Teddy’s face light up as he texts incessantly later that evening. Other parents might be annoyed by it, but Remus is really happy that Teddy is finally connecting with friends.

Besides, Teddy isn’t the only person making new friends. Alice texts Remus again on Monday, at around lunchtime. Remus is not joined by the usual band of queer students that day, and so, for the first time maybe ever, he spends his entire lunchtime on his phone.

Alice RLE: You know, if you have such a fun name for me, I should come up with a good one for you.

Remus: technically, you came up with your own nickname

Alice RLE: Yes, Rat Lover Extreme was entirely my creation.

Remus: okay RLE stands for a lot of things but not that
Remus: wtf

Alice RLE: Have something against rats?

Remus: extremely bigoted against them actually

Alice RLE: Hmmm…Rat Racist isn’t a very fun nickname though. Not very positive.

Remus: the nickname has to be positive?

Alice RLE: Of course! I want to be happy when I see the notifications for your endless texts that you’ll be sending me.

Remus: is my inherent charm and charisma not enough for that

Alice RLE: You joke, but I think you’re full of both charm and charisma!
Alice RLE: Your charisma stat is +2 at least.

Remus: you play dnd?

Alice RLE: No, but my son does, at Marauder’s Comics and Games.

Remus: wait…you said your last name is longbottom

Alice RLE: Hard to forget.

Remus: is your son neville??

Alice RLE: Yes?

Remus: asjdkfosi
Remus: oh my god
Remus: teddy is in that group too

Alice RLE: Really?? Wait, is he playing the werewolf?

Remus: well technically they’re a druid with wild shape
Remus: so they’re a shapeshifter, since they aren’t affected by the lunar cycle
Remus: you know what, nevermind, unimportant
Remus: yes, the answer is yes, he’s the werewolf
Remus: how did you know?

Alice RLE: Not a ton of blue haired kids about, are there? Should’ve figured it out sooner, really.

Remus: fair, he’s a pretty memorable kid
Remus: has neville been enjoying it? it’s all teddy talks about

Alice RLE: Neville has been having so much fun. He’s not chatty usually, but he’s been talking our ear off about DnD since Thursday.

Remus: seemed like they had a lot of fun
Remus: i have my next class in a few, but it was nice chatting

Alice RLE: Same to you, Wolf Dad.

Wolf Dad: wolf dad, really?

Alice RLE: :)

Remus is in quite a good mood for the rest of the day. They’ve only had two conversations outside of the record store but Alice’s friendly banter is incredibly endearing. Remus is not one to believe in fate or destiny, but it is a lovely coincidence that her son is also in the DnD group. He could see himself actually getting to know Alice, texting her again.

Of course, there is a limit to these things. Remus is not the most reliable of friends. It worked with Nym, because if anyone got unreliability it was her. For the whirlwind that she was, you’d never guess that she would be so patient and understanding. Yet, when Remus disappeared for two days, hardly able to get out of bed with the amount of pain he was in, she was never offended. She would simply show up at Remus’s door, pain meds and tea and takeout. She just got Remus in a way no one else had. Besides their (slightly drunken) night of passion that had got them Teddy, what they had wasn’t sexual, and it was never for a moment romantic. But it was also different, more intense, than what a typical friendship would consist of.

Sure, Remus wanted more. Still does, in fact. He craves intimacy, the kind he hasn’t had since his college years. Not just casual sex, or even a good friend. He craves that late-night pillow talk where you talk about everything and nothing simply because you want to know that other person that much better. He craves romantic dinners and grand gestures and tiny ones, too. He craves sex, but the kind where an “I love you,” doesn’t feel out of place. He hasn’t had that since before Teddy, because it’s rather hard to start a relationship when you’re co-parenting a small child. The people that could have been into Remus were thrown off by his and Nym’s odd little arrangement, and it never really got past that. Then, in the years since her passing, the few times that Remus has attempted to connect with anyone he’s found himself unable, somehow. As if his grief had formed some sort of fortress around him, one that he could not climb out of.

And fuck, Remus doesn’t blame Nym for her life or her death, isn’t ungrateful for her, for the support she gave him and he returned. Remus feels her loss dearly, still, even years later. He wonders what his life would be, had she lived. When he thinks about it, it always seems better than his life now, and yet also not what he really wants.

Remus’s thoughts are still swirling when he arrives home alone. Teddy sent a quick text after school, letting Remus know he was heading to Marauder’s. Remus doesn’t even know what he does there, considering their stock probably doesn’t change that often, but he recalls the tables, the shelf of open board games, and hopes that maybe Teddy is playing a board game with a new group of friends.

Remus goes through his usual evening routine of tea and chores. He’s just finished with the dishes when he hears his phone buzz. He lifts it, expecting to see a “come get me,” text from Teddy, but it’s not what is waiting for him.

(Unknown): your son has just shown me a veeeerrry interesting video

Confused, and quite frankly a little panicked, Remus opens his phone to see that this text is from Marlene, the woman at the Marauder’s register the other day. He sighs a little, panic subsiding for the moment.

Remus: oh god
Remus: whatever it is it’s fake

Marlene: so that wasn’t you playing 20th century boy
Marlene: sorry must have been another tall handsome bass player
Marlene: with a different blue haired son

Remus: thought he was being suspicious yesterday
Remus: okay yes it was me, i was the one playing t.rex

Marlene: teddy was right
Marlene: you’re brill
Marlene: with the voice of an angel???

Remus: don’t make fun

Marlene: oh i am not
Marlene: I’ve never been attracted to a man a day in my life
Marlene: but watching that video i had to reconsider for a moment

Remus: you’re being dramatic

Marlene:no, that’s sirius
Marlene: she hasn’t formed a coherent sentence since she watched the video
Marlene: made teddy send it to her
Marlene: literally on the floor babbling incoherently

Remus: christ she is the dramatic one
Remus: so my son is distributing videos of me without my consent
Remus: lovely

Marlene: you really are
Marlene: in the words of sirius: those fingers

Remus: you’re taking the piss, it’s not even that complex of a song

Marlene: but it’s the way you play it
Marlene: not to mention all the little extra flourishes you threw in there
Marlene: fucking sick

Remus: I’ll just take your word for it

Marlene: oh you will
Marlene: i always get my way
Marlene: you’re coming to our next jam session btw

Remus: i’m busy that day

Marlene: ha ha
Marlene: your son is on this with me, so you can’t lie your way out of this
Marlene: its wednesday evening at the shop
Marlene: me sirius and my gf dorcas
Marlene: sirius said teddy could watch the shop while we practice so he’s already taken care of

Remus: fuck
Remus: tell teddy i’m kicking him out of our shared calendar

Marlene: shared calendar? father-son bonding at its finest
Marlene: but you tell him yourself
Marlene: his favorite dm left for the evening and now he’s suddenly ready to leave

Remus: dm being sirius?
Remus: thought she was a puddle

Marlene: so did i, didn’t think she’d ever recover
Marlene: but he always takes Monday nights off to spend with his kid
Marlene: nothing gets in the way of that
Marlene: not even hot bassists

Remus: i’d argue that as a lesbian you can’t determine my level of hotness

Marlene: i’m not the one that said it ;)

Remus doesn’t know what to do with that information. Apparently Sirius, his kid’s DM, has seen one video of him playing the bass and decided he’s hot. Remus hasn’t been called hot in ages, and he doesn’t think the word can really apply to him. After all, in the video he was wearing joggers and a jumper with little holes at the wrists where he’s worn it down over time with his worrying. His face is crossed with scars from that bad car accident when he was a teenager. And Remus doesn’t think hot can really apply to someone whose typical gait could be described as a “hobble.” No, surely this Marlene is exaggerating.

It’s this thought that reassures him as he pulls into the Marauder’s parking lot, finding the space that he’s already thinking of as his. Marlene gives him a little wave from the store window as Teddy steps out, bag over one shoulder. He’s talking the moment he opens the car door.

“You can be mad at me all you want, Da, but you’re a fucking top notch bassist-”

“Teddy.”

“-and I knew you’d never play with Marlene on your own-”

“Teddy.”

“-so I took matters into my own hands-”

“Teddy.” He finally stops his monologue and looks over to see his father’s smiling face.

“Thanks, kiddo.” Teddy smiles back now, lighting up his whole face.

“Don’t mention it.”

**

Tuesday lunch brings with it Harry and the queer kids he’s collected. Remus has gathered that Harry has been doing this for a couple years now, and there’s really quite a lot of them at this point. They fill half of Remus’s classroom, making for quite a noisy lunch period. Usually they split into smaller groups to chat, but today they’ve moved the desks into one big circle, discussing the big Lions vs. Snakes football game on Saturday.

Of course, the conversation doesn’t stay completely united for long, not with a dozen Year 9s and 10s in a room together. Dean gets an idea for a poster to bring to the match and is sketching, Seamus looking over his shoulder and commenting with approval. Remus thinks it’s only a matter of time before those two get together, and makes a note to pair them up for the next partner reading session. Parvati and Lavender are writing new chants that Remus thinks are supposed to be Christmas themed, but they keep laughing over them so much that he can’t actually tell what they’re saying. Meanwhile, Harry and Ron have descended into tactics talk as they tend to do, dissecting lineups and discussing new plays. They both seem to have great brains for the game, and Remus won’t be surprised if one or the other ends up captain someday. Ron’s younger sister does not seem to agree with this take though, as she keeps loudly speaking over them to criticize the flaws in their plans, leaving Harry looking offended and Ron looking bright red.

This inevitably descends into an argument between the pair of siblings, which Harry is smart enough to back out of. Remus watches him scan the room, obviously looking for someone else to talk to. He looks to Hermione first, but quickly moves on when he sees that she’s in an animated discussion with Susan and Padma, gesturing enthusiastically at a book open between them. Harry enjoys reading, but not to the extent that Hermione does. He smiles softly to himself as his eyes move over Dean and Seamus, and then his eyes inexplicably brighten when they land on Remus.

Before Remus can say anything, Harry is plopping himself into the chair beside Remus’s desk, the one he uses when he’s doing one on one work with a student.

“How are you, Moony?”

“I’m well, Harry. What about you?” Harry nods, almost to himself, as he looks around the room. He’s softening as he sits beside Remus, a gentle kind of glow settling over his features.

“They all look really happy.” Remus looks out over the room now, too, eyes landing on Ron and Ginny, whose faces now match their bright red hair. He turns to see Harry watching them, too.

“I know it doesn’t look it, but they both love arguing with each other. I think Mione is the only person that Ron likes arguing with more.” Remus chuckles at that. The odd relationship between Ron and Hermione, consisting of equal parts intense bickering and deep affection, is legendary amongst the staff.

“I’ve always wondered what my siblings would have been like if my parents weren’t murdered.” Remus chokes a little on the tea he’s sipping and has to fight to keep his coughing under control. He doesn’t know where Harry inherited his bluntness from, the casual way he’ll bring up the night his parents died, how he got his scar. He’s only mentioned his parents to Remus two or three times before this conversation, but it’s always in this seemingly-out-of-nowhere way. It’s so different to how Remus and Teddy bring up Nym, which is rarely and with great care, and Harry’s contrasting style throws Remus off.

“I wonder if we’d fight like that,” Harry is saying, and Remus isn’t sure if Harry is even talking to him at all. “Sometimes I think we wouldn’t, because why would I want to fight with them? I hate fighting with Ron and Mione, I appreciate them too much. But then I think, if I had a sibling that means my parents never died and I wouldn’t really know what it was like to lose someone, and maybe I wouldn’t appreciate my sibling so much, then. Maybe we would fight.”

Remus doesn’t know what to say to this, especially when he’s asked himself similar questions and has never found the answer. The room is still filled with Ron and Ginny’s argument, and Lavender and Parvati’s raucous laughter, and Hermione’s monologue, and it feels so in contrast to the boy huddled in the seat beside him. He’s discussing his parent’s death like an episode of a TV show, one that he’s only mildly interested in, and yet all Remus feels is waves of deep sadness coming from his student. Maybe a bit from inside himself as well.

“We can never know for sure. Siblings are…” and he watches Ginny stand angrily from her chair and huff over to Hermione, “complicated.”

“Do you have one?” Harry asks. He does this sometimes, asks about Remus’s personal life. Remus doesn’t know why he’s so interested.

“No,” he says, and he thinks that’ll be the end of it, but Harry is looking at him like he wants more details. This is the part where, if it were anyone other than Teddy or Harry, Remus would change the subject as artfully as he could. But it is Harry, and Remus just can’t say no.

“I think I’ve mentioned that I had health problems as a child,” he begins, and Harry nods, green eyes staring intently back at Remus. “They took up a lot of my parents’ time and energy, so having more kids never really crossed their mind.” It’s a simplified version of the truth, but it’s the version that is easiest to tell Harry, and he nods and looks away, satisfied with the answer.

“Did you want one?” he asks. Remus thinks of the lonely afternoons in their Cardiff flat, making himself an after-school snack and reading book after book and staring at the record player wishing he had someone to twirl around with like he and his mother used to do.

“Yes.” Harry doesn’t answer this time, apparently not needing an explanation. Sometimes, Harry and Remus just understand each other in a way that doesn't require any words.

Harry looks sadder than when he came in, or maybe he just isn’t hiding it as well as he was before. There is an ocean of sadness inside of Harry that he works hard to keep covered, and the glimpses that Remus has had of it have been frightening endeavors. Remus wants to calm the waves a bit before the bell, which is only five minutes away.

“You know, you can appreciate someone, and love them, and still fight sometimes.” Harry gets that furrow in his brow that he gets when he’s puzzling over something.

“Really?”

“Do you and Pads ever fight?”

“No,” he says, simply. “Do you and Teddy?”

“Sometimes,” Remus says, and then considers. “Less so recently.”

“How come?” Remus has to pause now, figuring out the best way to answer. He wants to be honest with Harry, but he doesn’t want to make him sad. Harry takes on the sadness of others like a sponge.

“His mother died. We fought more for a while, right after it happened. But now we communicate better. We can move past the little things easier.”

“Because they aren’t so important anymore,” Harry adds. Remus nods, knowing the words Harry left unspoken. Because now you know losing them is so much worse.

“I don’t like fighting,” Harry continues. “Pads doesn’t either. So we just don’t. I don’t think we’re able to be angry with each other.”

“Everyone gets angry with each other sometimes, Harry,” Remus says, but Harry shakes his head.

“Not me and Pads,” he replies without hesitation, so confidently that Remus nearly believes him. “Even when one of us is upset, we don’t fight.”

Harry says this as if it’s a general statement, but his arms, which have been gently crossed over his stomach, visibly tense. Remus sees his hand clutch the sleeve of his jumper for a moment.

“Is Pads okay?” Remus can’t help but ask. Pads is Harry’s primary support system. If something is wrong with them, it would have a big impact on Harry.

“She’s the reason I’m thinking about it, really. Siblings and all that.” Now it’s Remus’s turn to give a silent, encouraging look to Harry. More details, please.

“He had a brother,” Harry says, and the past tense makes Remus ache a little. So much loss in one little family. “He died a little while before my parents, when I was very small. I think they had one of those complicated relationships you mentioned, but not like Ron and Ginny. Different from that. Pads doesn’t really like to talk about it, but they always get sad near their brother’s birthday.”

Harry sighs then, deeply, and Remus can see that he’s trying to take care of his godfather as much as his godfather is trying to take care of him, as much as he’s trying to take care of the other students in this room, in the school at large. It’s that giant heart of his, one that has been torn to shreds and trampled on and defiantly keeps functioning. As if he’s decided that it’s his job to take on the hurt of those around him, to keep them from feeling what he feels. Remus feels that same urge right now, wants to take all this hurt from this kid and swallow it whole.

“Is it soon?”

“Christmas Eve.” Remus wants to find whichever deity has fucked this boy’s life over and hurl them into the sun. Harry’s parents were murdered on Halloween, still in their costumes, and now Harry spends his Christmases with a godfather mourning the death of their brother. It’s so deeply unfair to this child beside him.

“You have a kind heart, Harry,” Remus says, and the phrase doesn’t nearly encompass all that he feels towards his student. But Harry looks back at him, eyes wide and shining.

“That’s what Pads always says about my parents.” He’s looking at Remus in awe and wonder, and that’s when the bell rings. Immediately the room is filled with chairs scraping against tile, calls of “Bye Moony” as the kids file out of the room, and Harry is able to pretend to tie his shoes in the commotion, hiding his face from view. Ron and Hermione stay behind, and Remus watches their wordless exchange as Harry fumbles with the laces. He looks up and gives them a bright, reassuring smile that neither of them believe but both of them accept.

Remus’s conversation with Harry is still playing in the back of his mind throughout his last two periods of the day and as he settles at his desk after the final bell. Teddy has texted that he’s off to Marauder’s with his DnD group, all of them piled into Molly Weasley’s eight passenger van. Remus decides to stay at school until Teddy’s estimated finish time at six, and pulls over the stack of essays he has yet to start grading.

Two hours later and he is woefully behind. His thoughts drift over to Teddy: is he having fun? Is he still getting along with his DnD group? Is he remembering to chat or is he too focused on his art? Then they drift to Harry for a bit: did he cheer up after their conversation? How much more sadness is he hiding? Will he have a happy Christmas or spend the holiday worried over his godfather? By the time Remus’s thoughts have returned to Teddy, it’s 10 til 6 and he’s read the last sentence three times and comprehended nothing. Remus flips the paper up and sees that the next essay is Hermione’s. Her introduction takes up almost the entirety of the first page, and Remus flips through to confirm that yes, it’s at least double the minimum length required and likely written in 11 point font rather than 12 point like he asked. It’s the nail in the coffin for his productivity. He rather optimistically grabs the stack of half graded essays in one hand, his bag in the other, and decides to head to Marauder’s.

Not long after he’s parked, in his usual spot next to a silver motorbike that he guesses belongs to Sirius, his phone vibrates.

Cenaw Arth: come inside, we’re not done yet

Blaidd Tal: i’d rather not move right now

Cenaw Arth: harry sees your car and wants to say hi
Cenaw Arth: also i want to show you romy

It’s a double whammy and Teddy knows it. Remus didn’t even know Harry would be here, seeing as he’s not in their DnD campaign, and Teddy knows Remus can’t resist saying hi to the kid. He sighs, knowing he’s defeated, and grabs his things from the passenger seat. Knowing Teddy, he’s only half finished and won’t be leaving for another hour at least.

The door jingles a little as he steps through it, essays sliding around a little under his arm. He clutches them tighter as he looks towards the back corner, the sound of Arctic Monkeys drifting over the store speakers. Teddy sticks out, blue hair and close to his father’s height, and he’s bent low over the little figurine he picked up the previous weekend. He’s singing along to the music absentmindedly as he paints delicate little lines onto Romy’s pants. He’s seated between two red heads that look like carbon copies of each other, and so must be Fred and George. Between the three of them, the whole right side of the table looks like it survived some sort of fantasy battle, where each alien race had a different colored blood. Fred and George are smeared in the stuff, little multi-colored lines joining their freckles. The other side of the table is much more subdued. Remus’s eyes are immediately drawn to the boy, who shares Alice’s round, friendly face. This must be Neville. The girl, Cho, is seated beside him and is consulting with him, comparing two little plastic pots of paint that are slightly different shades of green.

Remus begins to make his way to the back corner just as Harry stands up from his spot next to Cho, rounding the corner of the table with an eager grin on his face. He looks much better than he did when he left from lunch earlier that day, and the sight makes Remus feel as if he hadn’t breathed in a couple hours and suddenly is able to. There is no sadness in those green eyes now, only excitement. He’s calling “Moony!” and Remus prepares himself for an eager hug, when he catches movement out of the corner of his eye and turns to see a back door opening.

“Alright, who wants-” the person opening the door pauses, and makes eye contact with Remus, “the Hot Bassist?”

Remus is vaguely aware of Teddy calling out, “Ew, Sirius, that’s my Da,” just as Harry says something about “you can’t call my teacher hot.” Remus doesn’t fully comprehend this though, because he’s staring at the most beautiful person he’s seen in his life. They look like Adonis and Athena and the night sky. Their dark hair falls to their shoulders in gentle waves, the backdrop on which the stars are set. Remus never knew stars could be blue before, but that’s exactly what their eyes are, blue stars. Their skin is iridescent, as if galaxies resided there. Their mouth is set into a lovely little “oh” that Remus feels the immediate desire to press into and taste.

The smack of Remus’s bag hitting the floor, followed by the whisper of papers sliding against each other, breaks Remus from his reverie. He immediately stoops to gather his things, feeling his face grow warm, but Harry is already there, eagerly snatching up papers into a haphazard pile. He grabs Hermione’s last, and rolls his eyes fondly as he flicks through it.

“She used 11 point font again,” he sighs.

“Hey,” Remus calls, only somewhat regaining his equilibrium somewhat now that he’s no longer staring into the face of a real-life deity. “What have I told you about not looking at other people’s work?”

“Please, Moony,” Harry answers, rolling his eyes. Whatever he is about to say is lost because there is a sharp intake of breath from behind him, and Harry turns to look at the gorgeous person that Remus is avoiding looking at.

“Oh right. Pads, this is Moony. Moony, meet my godfather, Sirius.” There is another moment of silence while the pair look at each other again. Remus feels his breath leave his body as the pieces fall together.

“You’re Harry’s godfather, and you’re Teddy’s DM?” Sirius nods, her mouth still slightly open in a way that is devastatingly tantalizing.

“You’re Moony, and you’re the Hot Bassist?” Remus thinks he might melt into the floor, because that’s the second time that Sirius, literal god among mortals, has just referred to him as hot. There is no way Sirius really means this, considering the awkward hang of Remus’s jumper and the scars that cut across Remus’s nose. He is saved from responding by the sound of a very loud groan and a thunk as Teddy collapses his head into the table.

“Stop. Calling. My Da. Hot,” he says, punctuating each word with a knock of his head against the table, as if this is an argument he is tired of making.

“I just call ‘em like I see ‘em, Teddy,” Sirius answers, pulling his eyes away from Remus like it’s the last thing he wants to do. Remus thinks he’ll never move again, except Harry is holding out the stack of essays and Remus’s bag, and Remus is embarrassed enough as it is, so he finds the strength to take the bag from Harry and make his way closer to the table where all the kids are gathered.

“I regret sending you that video,” Teddy says, lifting his head back up to inspect his figurine. “All of you,” he adds, gesturing with his paintbrush to the assembled group members. Remus finds himself mortified when they blush. They’re all Year 11s and 12s, save Harry, so he doesn’t have them as students, but knowing that he is apparently, somehow, not just the Queer Teacher but the Hot Queer Teacher is sending him into orbit in a terrifying, unable to breathe sort of way.

“Did you really not know? Either of you?” Harry asks, looking incredulously between Sirius and Remus.

“No way, kiddo,” Sirius says to Harry. “You’re the one that didn’t bother telling me that Teddy’s Da was your teacher, so you don’t get to give me any shit for this.”

“I’ll give you shit anyway and there’s nothing you can do to stop me,” Harry responds, a mischievous look in his eyes.

“Is that a challenge?”

“It’s a challenge.”

“Are you sure about that?” Sirius has placed their phone on the table, and is stalking around the table, wiggling his fingers threateningly.

“Not a challenge, not a challenge!” Harry calls, backing up, but it’s too late. Sirius snatches him before he can run away, digging their fingers into Harry’s sides, leaving him shrieking in laughter until he’s doubled over on the floor. Remus has never heard him so happy.

“Stop, stop!” He finally wheezes, and Sirius immediately lets go of Harry, only to pull him into a tight bear hug and place a kiss on the center of his forehead.

“I win,” he grins, letting go of a red-faced Harry, who sticks his tongue out at Sirius’s back as she walks away.

“As I was saying, I’m ordering pizza. Any food allergies or restrictions I’m not aware of already?” He lists off a series of food restrictions from memory, somehow including the fact that both Remus and Teddy are Kosher and reassuring them that she’s choosing a restaurant that’s completely Kosher, even though Remus has never even spoken to her before, and before he can argue that Sirius does not need to buy him dinner, they’ve stepped away to place a delivery order.

Harry seems to have recovered from Sirius’s brutal attack, and is waving Remus over towards Teddy. He pulls the bag and essays back out of Remus’s hands, tossing them on a nearby table and heading back over to Teddy.

“Romy looks so incredible, you’ve got to see!” Teddy looks incredibly pleased by this compliment. For as much as he paints, not many others see what he does.

“It’s only okay really, I’ve never painted a minifig before.”

“No way, they look so cool. How’d you get them to look so…” he pauses to think of the right word, sliding down into an empty chair beside Teddy. “Rugged, like that?”

Teddy launches into a pretty detailed explanation, which eventually turns into a demonstration where he mixes paints on the little paper plate that he’s using as a palate, and then uses his pinky finger (which Remus can now see is covered in paint) to place the paint on his little figurine just so. Remus can practically see Teddy’s brain revving up, can tell he’s starting to go off on a tangent about finger painting. Remus knows that Harry is not an artist by any stretch of the imagination, and yet he seems to hang on Teddy’s every word, nodding his head eagerly at all the points Teddy is making about the merits of brushes versus sponges versus fingers. He looks at Teddy with the same sort of awestruck look that Teddy has when he talks about Sirius’s motorbike.

As if the very thought can summon them, Sirius is back at the table. She does a little loop around, complimenting each kid on their figures. Some are distinctly better than others - Neville’s is quite nice, and Cho’s is decent, but Fred and George’s are both a disaster. Still, Sirius compliments their bold use of color, and for all that the twins are joking about how disastrous their figures are they seem genuinely pleased at the kind words.

Sirius now pauses beside Remus to watch where Harry and Teddy are bent over Romy.

“I’d tell him how excellent the detail is on the wolf fur, but I don’t think he’d hear me,” they say.

“Teddy’s a bit of a selective listener when he wants to be.” Teddy doesn’t look up from his figure, but does throw a middle finger back at his father. Remus catches it, and before Teddy can pull it away again he has the offending finger near his mouth.

“Wolves eat birds, cenaw arth.” Teddy glances back just enough to show Remus that he’s rolling his eyes, and then slides his finger out of Remus’s grasp. He hunches back over Romy, and Remus knows it won’t be long before the rest of the world disappears from view, and it’ll just be Teddy and the little figure and the paint.

“Well,” Sirius says, suddenly sounding out of breath even though they were fine just a moment ago. “Pizza will be at least half an hour, so make yourself comfortable, Moony.” It’s a little odd to hear an adult call him that, but Remus loves the shape of the word on Sirius’s lips, the way they extend the “oo” sound just a stretch longer than usual.

He sits at the table that Harry dropped his things on and tries to focus on Hermione’s essay, but he can’t help but look back up at Sirius. They have the same kind of whirlwind nature to them that Teddy does, bouncing from kid to kid like a puppy that doesn’t know which person they want to pet them. Sirius returns to Harry most of all, even though Harry isn’t painting anything. He ruffles Harry’s hair, or asks him a question, or teases him, and Harry responds in kind, looks up at them with open admiration, like he’d do anything just to make Sirius happy.

Until Sirius suggests homework, of course.

“Come oooon, Pads,” Harry whines. “I’ll do it when we get home!”

“You won’t,” Sirius says, grabbing Harry’s backpack from the corner it was abandoned in, “because we’ve reached the finale of Fringe and I’m not waiting another night to find out what happens.”

Harry crosses his arms and sits lower in his seat, the way he does when he knows he’s losing an argument but isn’t ready to admit it yet.

“Come on, pup,” Sirius says, crouching down beside Harry’s chair. He leans over as if he’s going to tell Harry a secret, but they stage whisper so their voice carries over to where Remus is sitting. “I think Moony looks too lonely over there, he needs some company.”

Remus is watching Sirius when their gazes meet. Remus raises one eyebrow, which makes Harry giggle. Remus wants to enjoy the sound, except Sirius winks back and Remus could die on the spot. Instead, he chooses to roll his eyes and look back down at the still-unread essay, not taking in a single word in front of him. He doesn’t hear anything else, but a moment later the chair across from him moves. Remus looks up to find Harry getting settled, a scowl on his face as he pulls out a chemistry textbook.

It isn’t long before Harry is sighing heavily at his paper. He’s leaning his head into his hand, pressing his scar into his palm and clutching at his messy hair. It’s the position he gets in when he’s particularly stressed out by something, usually to the point where he won’t really be able to accomplish anything useful. It’s happened remarkably quickly, but then again, it’s an open secret that the chemistry teacher despises Harry. It makes a tricky subject even more challenging, and Harry is starting to look a bit overwhelmed.

“Alright, Harry?” Remus asks.

“Fine,” Harry says from between his teeth.

“You don’t look fine.” Harry looks up at Remus then, fixing him with a gaze that clearly expresses his annoyance.

“I hate chemistry.”

“No, you don’t like Mr. Snape, there’s a difference.” Harry’s scowl deepens at the mention of the chemistry teacher.

“Yea, well. Hard to learn from someone that actively hates you.” Remus’s instinct is to argue, but he’s overheard some comments that Severus has made in the teacher’s lounge. Harry isn’t wrong. Remus sighs.

“I’d offer to help, but I’m pants at chemistry.” This makes Harry laugh a little, as if he doesn’t really believe Remus could be bad at anything. He looks back down at his textbook, as if gearing himself up to try again, and the hand that left his face is already flying back up. Remus hates to see him so frustrated.

“When’s it due?” Harry looks confused. “The assignment, when’s it due?”

“Friday,” he answers.

“Well alright then. You’re not going to get any work done on it now, you’ll only give yourself a headache.”

“It’s the only homework I have tonight!” Remus is fairly sure that Harry has a math set due Thursday, but another idea has crossed his mind. He’s doing one-on-ones in class tomorrow, but those sessions he tries to keep to five minutes, and right now he has at least fifteen minutes left before the pizza arrives.

“That’s alright, because I want to talk to you about your essay.” Harry seems to pull back, looking apprehensive.

“What about it?”

“Nothing bad,” Remus laughs, shuffling through the finished papers to pull Harry’s from the pile. “We can do your one-on-one now, and then tomorrow during class Hermione can help you with chemistry. Sound good?” Harry looks reassured, though he’s still eyeing his essay like it’s going to jump off the table and snap at him. Still, he closes his chemistry book and shoves it to the side, scooting one chair closer so he can read his essay with Remus.

They spend the next fifteen minutes talking it over, determining what aspects of his writing that Harry should focus on in the next assignment. Remus and Harry have an easy, playful banter, which mostly involves Harry saying something he probably shouldn’t and Remus trying to mask his laughter with Stern Looks. There are a few moments where Remus hears what sounds like a snort of laughter from behind him, but he can’t find a good excuse to turn his body and see who made it. He hopes it’s Sirius, and then is embarrassed by the thought. Harry is embarrassed, too, when he finds out that Remus can very easily tell which sentences Harry came up with on his own and which are paraphrased from Hermione.

“That’s because your writing voice is very different from Hermione’s. And I don’t want to hear hers, Harry. I have six, 11 point pages of her voice. I want to know what Harry thinks.” Harry slouches in his seat, mumbling something. When Remus has Harry repeat what he has said, his heart breaks.

“Doesn’t matter what I think.”

“Who told you that?” Harry shrugs his shoulders, arms crossing his body as he slouches into his chair. Remus’s first thought is Pads, but no. Remus doesn’t know them very well but they aren’t the type of person to say something like that, especially not to their own godson. Sirius adores Harry; it’s obvious in every interaction they have. Remus supposes it could be one of Harry’s other teachers, Severus in particular, but that’s just speculation on Remus’s part. Harry, however, is not going to be forthcoming about this, and so Remus picks his battles.

“Well whoever it was, they were wrong. What you think matters very much, to Pads, to your friends, to me.”

“To you?” Remus is not expecting this to be the part that Harry latches onto, but he looks like he’s clinging to that phrase with white knuckles.

“Yes, it does. I care very much what you think, whether it’s about your classmates, or being bi, or the book we’re reading for class.” Harry looks a little awestruck when he nods back at Remus.

“I have an idea,” Remus decides, hoping that the pizza stays away for just five more minutes. “Let’s get a headstart on that next essay. No writing, I promise,” Remus says, seeing the light fade from Harry’s eyes a little. “I literally just want to know what you think, that’s all.”

“About the Iliad?”

“Yes, what did you think about it?”

“It was alright,” Harry says, noncommittally.

“What were the best parts?” Harry predictably starts listing off some of the high drama moments. Two characters in particular seem to be heavily featured.

“I noticed you talk a lot about Achilles and Patroclus. Do you like them?”

“Yes,” Harry gushes. “I really liked reading about them and their…how close they are.” He speaks like he wants to say something else but changes his mind at the last moment, pulling back.

“How close they are,” Remus repeats. Harry nods. Remus circles his hand in a way that says keep going, and Harry reluctantly continues.

“Like, how sad Achilles is when Patroclus dies. I know he's angry, but I think he's angry because he's so sad. It’s almost like he wanted to die too, just be with Patroclus again.” Harry is avoiding saying what he really wants to say, pulling farther and farther back from Remus.

“You’re holding back on me, Harry,” Remus says, and Harry’s eyes grow wide. “What do you really want to say about them?” Harry is silent, sitting on his hands and rocking side to side slightly.

“Forget the essay,” Remus says, leaning forward in his chair, a plea in his voice. “I don’t care about it right now. I want you to just tell me what you think. You’ve just got home, Pads asks you how your absolute favorite class went, and after you talk about chemistry,” this startles a laugh out of Harry, which was the goal, “he asks you about lit, about the Iliad, and you start talking about Achilles and Patroclus, and you say…”

“They’re so fucking gay.”

“Yes!” Remus exclaims towards the sky, louder than he anticipated. “Thank you! They are so fucking gay!” Harry stares open mouthed at Remus, and whoops, Remus did not mean to curse there. Talking with Harry outside of school was a bit more like talking with Teddy than with a student, and Remus had no language filter with his son. Remus is aware of a barking laugh behind him, but decides to ignore it in favor of finishing his point with Harry.

“That’s what I want you to write for your next essay. Tell me why Achilles and Patroclus are so fucking gay,” because he may as well go all in at this point. “Maybe leave out one of those words though.”

Harry nods solemnly, “Achilles and Patroclus are fucking gay,” and Remus can’t help but laugh, a full belly laugh, and when he recovers Harry is beaming.

“Harry,” Remus says, and Harry looks like he hears the sincerity creeping back into Remus’s tone. “What you think matters, okay? It matters to Pads, it matters to your friends, it matters to me. And if someone is telling you that it doesn’t matter, I want you to come tell me, okay? Or Pads, or some other adult that you trust.”

“Even if it’s an adult?” Harry nearly whispers. He’s staring down into his hands, and Remus is talking to his forehead again.

“Especially if it’s an adult.” Harry nods. Remus knows he won’t get anything out of him tonight, but he hopes Harry feels comfortable telling someone soon. Remus can’t imagine anyone treating such a kind, loving kid like that.

“I meant what I said earlier, you know. You’ve a kind heart.”

“Like my parents?” a sad eagerness plays into his voice.

“Like your parents, I’m sure.” Remus suddenly finds himself with an armful of teenager. He and Harry have hugged once or twice before. He’s a remarkably touchy person, constantly holding hands with his friends or giving someone an affectionate pat on the back. When he hugs, he hugs big. Remus realizes now that Harry has been holding back. The hugs before were the careful, gentle kind, symbolic of the close yet formal relationship that exists between a teacher and their student. But this hug felt more like the ones that Teddy gives him, full-hearted and unrestrained and filled with love.

Fuck, Remus loves this kid.

Harry lets go, and Remus sends him off to his godfather, “show off your essay.” Remus turns to watch him go, smiling, and is startled to find Sirius staring at him, a soft smile on her face as well. They give Harry their attention when he shoves the essay in front of her, but she keeps glancing back up at Remus.

They are interrupted by the jingle of the door, and a man carrying an impressively tall stack of pizza boxes. Sirius rushes off to help carry them and hands the man a tip as he leaves. Remus doesn’t miss the way his eyes widen at the bundle of cash that gets pressed into his hand.

Before long all the kids are crowded around a table that isn’t covered in paint and is instead covered in half empty pizza boxes. Fred and George are telling the story of one of their more infamous pranks, which the other kids clearly know but Teddy doesn’t. Still, they’re all laughing just as hard as Teddy is. Remus watches the way his head tilts back, his eyes wrinkle shut, his mouth opens wide. Normally Teddy looks like Remus, but when he laughs he looks like Nym. It makes Remus miss her.

“Kind heart, huh?” Remus jumps at the sound of Sirius’s voice as they sit in the chair next to his, pizza in hand.

“I call ‘em like I see ‘em,” Remus answers, an echo of Sirius’s statement earlier.

“It meant a lot to him,” Sirius continues. “Both what you said and the fact it was you. He adores you, Moony.” There it is again, Moony, with the “oo” just that little bit longer, so it’s nearly crooned.

“The feeling is mutual. You have an amazing godchild, Sirius, really. He cares so deeply for everyone around him.” Sirius gives one of those little laughs that’s really more of an exhale through his nose.

“That’s all his parents,” they say. They’re still facing the kid’s table, but her eyes are growing distant. “They were just like that, biggest hearts you could imagine. I try not to compare him too much. Don’t want to make him feel pressured to be like these people he only remembers bits and pieces of but…sometimes it’s just uncanny.”

They sit in silence for a moment, and Remus watches Teddy. He’s chatting with Harry now, the kind of conversation where they’re both only speaking in half sentences between bouts of laughter but they both somehow know what each other is saying. Teddy leans back and does that same wide mouthed laugh as before, the one that looks like Nym.

“He looks like his mother when he does that,” Remus finds himself saying. He hasn’t talked about Nym with anyone, except for a handful of times with Teddy, on really bad days.

“Teddy told me about his mum. Not a lot, just that she passed.” Remus doesn’t really know what to say to that, so he just nods. Sirius doesn’t seem like he knows what to do with silence, so they keep talking. “I was talking with him about a plot idea I had for a campaign I’m writing, and I mentioned two characters who were just friends but coparenting together, and Teddy goes, ‘like Mum and Da. They said they were best friends that had a baby together.’” Remus smiles at the memory, the exasperated way they always had to explain to teachers and other parents that they weren’t, in fact, married, or even together. He knows he could leave it at that, but something about Sirius is so inviting. Like he wants to let Sirius peek over his walls, just a little.

“Best friends sometimes doesn’t even feel like the right word to describe what Nym was to me. It was never romantic, and only physical the once, but she wasn’t just a friend, really, either.” Remus is prepared for the usual confusion, the nosy questions, but that’s not what he gets.

“She was a piece of your soul, and you were a piece of hers.” Remus looks over at Sirius, astounded. They are looking back at him, knowing.

“Harry’s dad, James, was like that for me. We called each other best friends, brothers, but none of it ever really matched what it was like, me and him. Everyone assumed we were together, especially after we both came out. But it was never like that with us, and it also wasn’t just a friendship. Soulmates is the closest word I’ve found for it.”

Silence again, between them. There is plenty of noise from the kid’s table, which has begun to devolve from pleasant dinnertime conversation to some sort of game that involves throwing pizza crusts at people’s heads. Teddy catches one on his head and the whole table cheers, Harry gleefully clapping him on the back.

“I don’t think he just gets it from his parents,” Remus says, watching Harry smile at Teddy. “His kind heart. I think that has something to do with you as well.” Remus looks over at Sirius to find him smiling, but it’s tight, doesn’t reach his eyes.

“You clearly don’t know me very well.”

“I know you better than you realize. All I hear about at lunch is Pads and what an amazing godfather she is, and all I hear about from Teddy is how cool his DM is.” Remus loves the smile that blooms on Sirius’s face at that, the tightness melting to reveal a galaxy underneath. Sirius turns and catches Remus’s eyes, blue meeting hazel, and suddenly it’s as if the world around them has faded from existence. Instead it’s all in Sirius’s eyes: planets, galaxies, constellations. A sparkling field of blue that contains everything Remus ever wants to learn, to know, to sink his teeth into. He is utterly entranced by the beauty of the universe, the entirety of it sat before him.

“Da!” Teddy calls, startling Remus out of Sirius’s gaze. Teddy’s voice holds a tone of forceful annoyance, as if he’s called for Remus multiple times now, and he narrows his eyes a little at his father. Remus knows he’s getting an earful as soon as they’re in the car. Teddy asks a question about what the Welsh word for deer is, and Remus answers without really comprehending what’s happening. His eyes flicker back to Sirius, but they’re now standing, and stretching a little. The band tee they’re wearing slides up his body, revealing a sliver of skin just above his jeans.

Shit.

“Alright, illustrious party members. It’s time to clean up.” Groans sound from around the table, which Sirius hushes by raising his hand. “Ah, ah, if Molly Weasley comes in to find pizza crusts on the floor and spilled paint on the table she will never allow the twins back in my doors again.” This is apparently enough of a threat, because soon everyone is tossing empty boxes into trash bins, or wiping down the tables, or collecting the little pots of paint and storing them in a box at one of the tables.

Before long, Alice arrives, with a loud “Wolf Dad!” at the sight of Remus.

“You’re really going with Wolf Dad?”

“Suits you,” she answers, with a friendly pat to Remus’s cheek. She collects Neville and Cho, who is apparently Neville’s neighbor, and they give a friendly wave as they leave.

Molly Weasley is not long behind, and Remus can almost immediately see where the twins got their intensity from. She is a force to be reckoned with, and is clearly used to being in command. Remus is fairly sure that she has seven kids total, but apparently every other person in her vicinity that she perceives as vaguely younger than her falls into the category of “Molly’s children.” She’s only in the store for about five minutes, but in that time she’s corralled the twins, reminded Harry to eat well before the big match against the Snakes on Saturday, reminded Sirius that Harry needs to eat well before the big match against the Snakes on Saturday, told Remus that he looks “a bit peaky” and says that she’ll send him her favorite beef stew recipe even though she and Remus have never spoken to each other in person before, and wiped a spot of paint from Teddy’s forehead affectionately. Sirius has to shove the extra pizzas in her hand and practically push her out of the door, and when she’s gone Remus finds himself breathing hard even though all he’d done while she was in the room was stand there.

“I’ll go get my things,” Teddy says, looking as winded as Remus feels. Remus, Sirius, and Harry gather their things as well, and the four of them walk out of the building, Sirius keying in a code in a pin pad beside the door to set an alarm.

The sun set a while ago, and they are lit by the lights that Sirius left on in the shop, as well as a couple streetlamps. Harry is showing off Sirius’s motorbike to Teddy, speaking in technical language that is far beyond Remus’s capacity.

“I should have your number,” Sirius says. Remus looks down at Sirius, raising that eyebrow. “As your son’s DM, and your student’s guardian, of course.”

“And you’ll only text me in that capacity, is that right?”

“Oh no, I’m definitely going to text you about other things.”

“And if I refuse?”

“Your son will give me your number.”

“He wo-”

“I will,” Teddy calls out.

“Traitor.” Teddy has turned back to Harry, and doesn’t respond.

“You’ve got a great kid,” Sirius smirks.

“So do you.” Sirius softens then, looking over at Harry with an unfathomable expression.

“Yea, I…” they pause with a look that almost reads as pain to Remus, before plastering on a smile. “He’s great.”

Before he can think about what he’s doing, Remus grabs the phone out of Sirius’s hand and puts his number in and, in a fit of possible insanity, types Moony as his first name and The Hot Bassist as his last. As he hands the phone back to Sirius, Remus lets his fingers brush up against those soft hands of hers. Sirius inhales sharply, eyes wide at the contact. Remus feels his own heartbeat speed up.

“Stop flirting with my teacher and take me home,” Harry calls, sliding a helmet over his head. Sirius’s face grows pink, and Remus imagines his looks the same given how warm it suddenly feels. Sirius recovers remarkably quickly, heading to the bike and grabbing their own helmet from Harry. They turn and call out to Remus, standing beside the driver’s side door.

“See you tomorrow, Hot Bassist.”

“Text me,” is all Remus says in response, before shutting the door behind him.

Teddy is already in the passenger seat, staring Remus down. They sit in silence as Remus turns on the car, listening to the sound of Sirius’s motorbike as it pulls out of the parking lot.

“We’re gonna talk abo-”

“No we’re not.” Teddy glares at Remus, but it’s a teasing glare.

“We’re not going to talk about how Sirius was flirting with you?”

“No, we’re not,” Remus repeats, backing out of their parking spot.

“And that you liked it?”

“No comment,” Remus answers.

Teddy gives up after that, but smirks when Remus’s phone vibrates about five minutes after they’ve left the shop. Remus can’t help the swooping feeling in his stomach at the sound, and has to stop himself from checking his phone the moment he parks in front of their building. Thankfully, Teddy heads straight to his room when they walk into their flat, and Remus promptly settles himself into the couch and opens the new chat.

(Unknown): hey cutie ;)

Remus laughs out loud at the stupid line, and yet feels a little warmth in his stomach at the sight of it.

Moony: you had your entire drive home to think of what you would send me and the best you can come up with is “hey cutie ;)”???
Moony: disappointing

Sirius: it’s an excellent line!!
Sirius: and it got you to text back didn’t it?

Remus would have texted back regardless of what Sirius said, but she doesn’t need to know that.

Moony: oh, yes, lets make cringe the foundation of our relationship

Sirius: relationship, huh? ;)

Remus blushes bright red, and is so glad Teddy isn’t in the room.

Moony: yes, relationship
Moony: as in, two people who know each other have a relationship
Moony: i have a relationship with my son
Moony: i have a relationship with your godson
Moony: i have a relationship with the owner of the record shop

Sirius: i was wondering how you know alice
Sirius: lovely woman
Sirius: and a lovely shop

Moony: i could spend hours in holyhead
Moony: i HAVE spent hours in holyhead

Sirius: shocking we haven’t run into each other there yet

Moony: i’m usually there saturday mornings
Moony: dragging poor teddy around
Moony: i had to promise him that we’d go to marauders every time i took him to holyhead

Sirius: take him to holyhead more often then

Moony: he’s in there nearly every day at this point

Sirius: and yet we’ve only just met today :(
Sirius: and so briefly :( :( :(
Sirius: when will i ever see you again

Moony: i’m literally seeing you tomorrow

Sirius: of course, band practice
Sirius: how could i forget

Moony: not band practice
Moony: i’m not in your band

Sirius: yet ;)

Moony: never

Sirius: untrue
Sirius: marls wants you
Sirius: and she always gets her way

Moony: seems like she’s not the only one that wants me

Sirius: she isn’t ;)

Remus sort of feels like he’s choking, and has to take a couple deep breaths before he can reply. Sirius keeps texting in the interim.

Sirius: i’m dying to see those magic fingers in person
Sirius: don’t worry about bringing anything btw, i’ve got a whole set up
Sirius: just bring your bass and your massive talent

Remus stares at the word massive, and knows he shouldn’t. But Sirius has been flirting with him incessantly and Sirius is fucking gorgeous and Remus hasn’t flirted with anyone in ages and it feels damn good, and so he takes a deep breath and types.

Moony: not the only thing that’s massive

Remus begins panicking as soon as text is sent. When Sirius doesn’t reply in the next thirty seconds, the panic grows. Remus stands, goes to the kitchen to make his usual cup of herbal tea before bed, pretends that his heart rate isn’t reaching dangerous levels. Two minutes later and Sirius still hasn’t replied, and Remus is carrying the steeping tea into his bedroom and pretending it isn’t shaking in his hands. He changes into his bedclothes, and still no text, and Remus thinks he’s having a breakdown. He’s gone way too far, too fast, ruined any and all chances he had. It’ll be weird with Harry now. Teddy laughs from his bedroom, the sound mocking Remus in his misery. He collapses into bed, forlorn.

His phone vibrates, and Remus’s heart rises into his throat, but he’s disappointed when it isn’t Sirius who’s texted.

(Unknown): idk what u did 2 my godfather but shes broken now

Moony: harry, how did you get my number?

Harry: teddy
Harry: shes literally on the floor
Harry: keeps giggling
Harry: i know its ur fault
Harry: its worse than the bass video

Remus is now having two additional panics on top of the one he was having, because while some teachers share their numbers with their students, Remus never has before. He’s always kept a boundary between him and his students, more than he’d like to, really. But being openly bi means an increased risk of facing horrible accusations, and Remus has never wanted to give those people any reason to suspect him. At the same time, the knowledge that Sirius is on the floor of their home giggling over Remus’s text is washing the fear out of his system and replacing it with unbridled excitement.

Moony: tell them to pull herself together and text me back

Then, he sends a quick text to Teddy.

Blaidd Tal: is there a reason you’re giving my number out to students

Cenaw Arth: not students, student
Cenaw Arth: he said something about
Cenaw Arth: actually i’ll just send you the screenshot

Remus opens the picture Teddy sends next.

Boy wonder: our parents r flirting
Boy wonder: pads is broken
Boy wonder: help pls
Boy wonder: i just want 2 watch fringe

Tall and blue: i refuse to be involved
Tall and blue: if i have to watch my da flirt i will literally vom

Boy wonder: im getting involved
Boy wonder: pads is nonfunctional
Boy wonder: send moonys #

Tall and blue: sure, but you can’t send it to anyone

Boy wonder: yea ofc

Remus feels his phone buzz and finds that Sirius has finally texted him back.

Sirius: bold

Moony: you doing alright over there?

Sirius: fantastic

Moony: physically incapable of sending more than a single word?

Sirius: yes

Moony: go spend time with your godson
Moony: take some deep breaths
Moony: i’ll see you tomorrow

Sirius: <3

Remus stares at that little heart for a moment, despite his phone buzzing with texts from both Teddy and Harry. Remus feels a strange sort of calm when he stares at it, a peace he hasn’t known in years. It’s foreign and new and keeps getting interrupted by the incessant buzzing of chatty teenagers. Christ, what has he gotten himself into?

Harry: k whatever u said worked
Harry: hes settled now
Harry: u gotta warn a kid b4 u do that tho
Harry: didnt plan on babysitting pads 2nite but

Moony: you’re welcome

Harry: ur fault in the 1st place but ok
Harry: FINALLY gonna watch fringe now
Harry: c u 2morrow moony

Moony: have a nice night, harry

Remus switches back to his chat with Teddy, dreading what he’ll find.

Cenaw Arth: so yea, he promised he wouldn’t share
Cenaw Arth: i trust him, and i know you do too
Cenaw Arth: we are going to talk about this btw
Cenaw Arth: the flirting

Blaidd Tal: tall and blue?

Cenaw Arth: stop deflecting
Cenaw Arth: you had sirius in a puddle
Cenaw Arth: AGAIN

Blaidd Tal: surely you can be a bit more creative than that

Cenaw Arth: harry asked me how i would describe myself in welsh and they were the only words i could think of
Cenaw Arth: and STOP IGNORING ME

Blaidd Tal: it was an innocent conversation

Cenaw Arth: yea yea sure
Cenaw Arth: just don’t start snogging in the middle of band practice tomorrow

Blaidd Tal: not in the band
Blaidd Tal: we’re reinstituting welsh only at meals btw
Blaidd Tal: tall and blue smh

Cenaw Arth: awww smh? you’re texting like a millennial now <3

Blaidd Tal: fuck off

Cenaw Arth: caru ti hefyd da

Remus calls out “caru ti” from his room, and knows, thanks to the absurdly thin walls in their cheap flat, that Teddy hears him.

**

Wednesday brings with it sunny weather, likely the last until Spring. Remus heads to Marauder’s straight after school like Sirius told him to do, letting Teddy put on some music to hopefully avoid the inevitable teasing about his and Sirius’s flirting. There’s another car in the parking lot already, besides Sirius’s motorbike, and Remus doesn’t know if he’s greatful or disappointed that someone else is already there.

The shop is strangely quiet without the usual background music, but it isn’t quiet for long.

“Moony!”

“Teddy!”

Sirius and Harry both round the front counter, matching expressions of glee on their faces. Harry immediately accosts Teddy with a hug, which both Remus and Sirius watch with fond expressions.

“Let me explain the register before you suffocate him,” Sirius teases. They pull Teddy underneath their shoulder to pull him around behind the register. He looks over to Remus as Teddy sets his bag down.

“Through that door,” they say, gesturing their head towards the back of the store. “I’ll be there in a minute.” Remus heads towards a door that he’s never seen open before, where the sounds of a guitar tuning can be heard. He looks back once before he steps through, bass slung over his shoulder, watching Sirius point out a couple things on the screen as Teddy nods along seriously. The sight of it makes Remus feel like some part that he’s been missing is slotting into place.

The room Remus walks into is larger than he expected. The walls are lined with tour posters and shelves of vinyls. There’s one of David Bowie that Remus feels like he may drool over if he isn’t careful. There’s a couch and a couple comfortable looking chairs. One of them is holding Marlene, sprawled out with that cherry red Explorer in her lap which she’s tuning by ear. Her red leather jacket is off, tossed careless over her guitar case, revealing heavily tattooed arms. There’s a drum kit in the corner, and another woman sitting beside it. She is dark-skinned, with long box braids and long nails, and she’s fucking gorgeous. She’s currently holding her phone up rather surreptitiously, aiming it at the distracted Marlene.

As Remus steps further into the room, Marlene glances up at him, a smile crossing her features.

“Remus! So glad you could make it. Set up wherever, the amp we use for the bass is over there, but the cables are long enough to reach anywhere in the room.” She points towards an amp beside the couch. As Remus approaches he can see it’s a particularly nice (and very expensive) one. It feels ridiculous to plug his cheap bass into such a nice amp.

“Oh! And Remus,” Marlene says as Remus sets his case down on the couch. “This is my girlfriend Dorcas.” Dorcas holds out her hand and Remus shakes it. Dorcas blatantly looks him up and down, and smirks.

“You’re hot for a man,” she says by way of greeting, and Remus feels his ears go warm.

“Told you,” Marlene says from behind them, now strumming out a couple chords. Remus goes about setting up his bass to distract himself, hooking up cables and situating himself on the couch. The stickers all over the body never fail to make him smile. Most of them were added by Nym, though a decent number, and all of the newer ones, are from Teddy.

Dorcas chats with him, asking about what he does, what sort of music he’s into. She’s just uncovered Remus’s lifelong obsession with Bowie when Sirius strolls in, pulling off his own leather jacket to throw on top of Marlene’s.

“Bowie fan, huh? Knew you had good taste, Moony,” he says, but Remus isn’t comprehending speech very well all of a sudden. Remus tries to resist ogling Sirius’s bare arms, but he isn’t very successful. They are covered in a patchwork of tattoos. Some are constellations, some look like the sort of runes you’d see used in an ancient ritual, some have the distinctive look of stick-and-pokes. One in particular is particularly scratchy, a messy “PRONGS” spelled out on Sirius’s forearm. Someone added lilies to it later, framing the word with such contrasting beauty that Remus almost wants to laugh at it if it weren’t so endearing.

Sirius slings their guitar over them, a solid black instrument that Remus is again sure is a very expensive Gibson. He opens an app to tune, the same one Remus uses, and then Remus remembers that he still needs to tune his bass instead of watching Sirius. It’s quiet then, save for the sound of quiet strings. Marlene is leaning back over the arm of her chair, fiddling with the dials on her amp upside down. Her top pulls up revealing a pierced belly button, and Dorcas is playing photographer again. Remus starts to feel his nerves then, suddenly comprehending that he’s about to play for someone other than Teddy for the first time in years.

His bass tuned up, he decides to play his go-to riff, the one he can do in his sleep. He wrote it himself for a song Nym was writing, but she ended up going in a different direction and the bass line was left abandoned. They both loved it, but never found the music that went with it, so instead it became his favorite warm up. The little piece takes him up and down the neck of his bass, with some decently intricate fingering and a satisfying off-kilter rhythm. As he plays, his nerves diminish. It’s just the same bass he’s used for years, and mostly the same Remus.

He stops to shake out his hands a little and pull up the sleeves of his jumper, which is getting in the way of his playing. Doing this reveals one of his own tattoos, the one he got soon after Teddy was born of a wolf and a bear running in a forest. Remus realizes then how quiet it is, and looks up to find the three others in the room staring. Sirius is open mouthed as her eyes comb over Remus’s hands and forearms.

“You’re even more impressive in person,” Marlene says, before turning to Sirius and snapping her fingers. “Oi! Padfoot! Loverboy! I’m not watching you drool over the Hot Bassist all night, get us started.”

Sirius is still staring at Remus but closes her mouth and manages to reply, “I can multitask.” Remus is feeling himself grow warm under the intense and open way that Sirius is staring at him, and embarrassed by the way he doesn’t want to look away. He is very thankful when Dorcas’s voice sounds from the corner.

“Unfortunately, we always start with Taylor Swift. Do you know any?” This statement is apparently what Sirius needs to break their reverie, because their mouth is suddenly open wide in a look of shock and offense so comical that Remus snorts in laughter.

“We do NOT slander the name of Taylor Swift in our most sacred space, Dorcas! We always bless the space with Taylor, no arguments.” Dorcas simply rolls her eyes at Sirius before turning back to Remus, expectant.

“Yea, I know a lot of her songs, actually, especially from Red.” Nym would listen to any and every genre of music with no discernment for quality, in Remus’s opinion, and this meant that she was a huge fan of Taylor Swift. Remus still listens to her new releases day of and pictures how much Nym would love them. He’s even found himself enjoying them on his own, though he’d never admit it.

“Good choice, good choice,” Sirius says, tapping his nails against the body of his guitar. “State of Grace?”

Dorcas doesn’t wait for an affirmative, just launches into the drums. For all that she is trying to look annoyed with Sirius, her face is already splitting into a grin as she pounds out the driving beat. Remus comes in not too far after, Marlene close on his heels. The bass line for this one is nauseatingly simple, and so Remus plays around with it during the long intro, finding something a little more interesting than the simple two note pattern in the recorded version. Sirius comes in last, playing lead guitar, and Remus realizes they hadn’t really discussed who would be singing, but then they reach the verse, and Marlene and Sirius both drop out, and Sirius begins to sing.

It’s truly unfair for Sirius to have both an incredible body and an incredible voice. They sing an octave down from the original, and it adds a sultry flavor to the song that Remus finds himself enjoying. Remus is still playing with the bass line, trying out new rhythms to play with Dorcas’s driving drums. There’s no guitar in this verse, save for a few notes from Sirius, but partway through the verse Marlene is jumping in, adding a rhythm guitar line that builds off of Remus’s improvised bass. He glances over at Marlene to find her grinning, singing backup to Sirius when they reach the chorus.

It stays like that for the rest of the song, playful and fun. Remus can’t resist watching Sirius, the way his rings look on his fingers, the way she flings her hair back on the words “brave and wild.” Marlene and Dorcas both sing the backup vocals for the final chorus, and Remus finds himself joining in, simply because he’s having a great time, as Sirius’s vocals extend above them. They finish on a quiet note, matching grins on all of their faces. That was way too fun.

“And that, my dears, is why we start with Taylor,” Sirius says, smug. He can’t, however, convince any of them to play anything else by Taylor, and they pass the next hour throwing out songs, and when they all know one (or can pick it up quickly) they dive right in. Sirius and Marlene alternate between both lead and rhythm guitar and lead and backup singer, but they never discuss before they start. They seem to just intuitively know which parts will suit them better, and Remus surmises that they’ve been playing together for many, many years. An hour in, Marlene is begging them to play “Cherry Bomb,” which she describes enthusiastically as her anthem. When they agree, she gets out of the chair she’s been lying across and sings it directly in Sirius’s face, and they toss their head back in joyful laughter, and Remus thinks it’s the most beautiful sight he’s ever seen. They end the song screaming “Cherry Bomb!” At each other over and over, long after they’ve all stopped playing.

“Let’s do another female lead, that was fun,” Marlene requests, out of breath and cherry faced.

“Do you know Olivia Rodrigo?” Dorcas asks, looking at Remus. He snorts before he can stop himself.

“Extremely familiar,” he responds, still laughing to himself.

“Care to share the joke?” Sirius asks.

“Just pick a song and start, you’ll see,” Remus answers. Marlene and Dorcas say “Brutal” simultaneously, and Sirius wastes no time counting them all in.

As soon as they play that first iconic phrase, Teddy’s voice can be heard through the open door screaming “fuck yes!” Remus grins then, and looks up to find Sirius grinning back at him. He mouths “listen” to Sirius and then to Marlene, each of whom nod as they begin the first verse.

Sure enough, as their instruments drop out, Teddy can be heard screaming the lyrics.

“Get your arse in here!” Sirius calls, laughing. In moments Teddy has bounded into the room, still scream-singing the words. When he makes his usual lyric change in the chorus, from “kind of thanks” to “fucking thanks,” Dorcas whoops in approval. The instrumental before the second verse plays, and Teddy gives Remus a look that says we’re doing this the way we always do. Remus tries to argue back with a look of his own, but then it’s time for the second verse and Remus finds himself singing it like it’s just them in their flat.

Then Teddy is right in front of him, pulling at his arm even though Remus is still playing, and Remus finds himself standing because he just can’t say no to his son. They find themselves in the middle of the room, screaming the chorus to each other the way they always do, uncaring of the other people watching. Their instruments drop out suddenly again for the outro, and Remus is singing the lower harmony he’d picked out for himself after countless days listening to this song on repeat.

“Holy shit, Teddy, you never said you could sing,” Sirius is saying as soon as they’re done. Teddy shrugs, modestly.

“Never came up.”

“You don’t sing like your Da. Where’d you learn?” Marlene is asking now, and she’s right. While Remus’s voice is raspy and rough, Teddy’s is chesty and strong.

“He sings like his mum, that’s why,” Remus answers, giving Teddy a fond hair ruffle. He blushes a little, always loving the comparison between him and his mother. Nym had given Teddy voice lessons practically from birth. They were both screaming when he came into the world, and Nym taught Teddy to channel that noise into something beautiful.

Remus waits for questions for Marlene and Dorcas about Nym, but neither of them say anything, and Remus wonders how much Teddy has shared with them.

“One more Teddy, what do you want to sing?” Sirius is asking, bouncing between her feet. If she had a tail, it’d be wagging.

“Aren’t I supposed to be watching the front?”

“Close enough to closing. Oi! Harry! Lock up!” Sirius shouts at the open door before turning back to Teddy, eager. “So, what’re we playing?” Remus knows the answer before Sirius has finished the question.

“Arctic Monkeys,” he says at the same as Teddy does, and Teddy casts him an annoyed glance.

“Excellent,” Marlene says from her chair. “Which one?”

“Dancing Shoes,” Teddy says, grinning at Remus. Remus knows he’s picked it because Remus loves the bass line for this one. Dorcas also looks quite pleased, tossing her head back to get her braids behind her with a grin on her face.

“We’ll take your lead, Teddy,” Sirius says. Teddy starts, and Remus and Dorcas begin with that bass and those drums. Teddy sings the little riffs in the verses with ease, and he can’t stop himself from dancing along a little. Remus is still standing and finds himself moving his shoulders along with the catchy little bass line. Marlene stands when she and Sirius come in on the chorus both with their instruments and as backup vocals, the four of them head banging along to the punchy chords. Remus catches sight of Harry in the doorway doing the same, albeit a little awkwardly.

As they move into the second verse, Marlene and Sirius add their guitars, mimicking the bassline. Remus keeps finding his eyes drawn to Sirius as they bounce along to Dorcas’s drums. They’re ethereal and punk all at once, with a masculine push of the hips and a feminine sway of the head. She takes lead guitar, adding harmony to Remus and Marlene, and Remus finds himself once again staring at her fingers, the way they press against the strings. Remus can’t help but sing at the chorus with them, eyes finding Teddy once again and loving the smile crossing his face as he calls out the words above the rest of them.

Sirius takes the guitar solo, and Remus now has an excuse to openly stare as he plays through it effortlessly, adding his own little trills and improvisations. When Sirius throws their head back, Remus is drawn to the line of their chin, the piercings adorning their ears, the upper edge of a tattoo curving around the back of their neck. Sirius lowers her head again, looking directly into Remus’s eyes, and Remus can’t even bother to be embarrassed when she looks back at him so hungrily.

Remus is so distracted he loses track of his hand for a moment, only just barely finding his rhythm again when the final verse starts back up. Teddy crouches low as he starts the final verse, and Remus finds himself mimicking his son, letting his bass hang from the strap on his neck and extending his arms long. When he rises for the final lines of the song, he finds that Sirius and Marlene are also rising from crouches of their own, building into that last, punchy phrase. Remus is grinning wide when they hit the last chord, and so are Sirius and Marlene and Dorcas and Teddy and Harry, and it feels like they’ve stumbled into something so right, so unbelievably complete. Remus thinks that if they just keep playing together, he’ll never feel lonely or sad ever again. He’ll have everyone he needs in that little room, and isn’t it so weird to think that about these people he’s barely met? Yet, based on the looks the others are giving they feel it too, feel that magic bond that happens when something just clicks.

And then Marlene’s stomach grumbles.

“Way to ruin the moment, Marls,” Sirius sighs. “Wanna get takeaway?”

“Please,” she says, slumping back onto her chair, breathing hard from the previous song.

“Can we get Indian? I’ve had a daal makkhani craving all day,” Dorcas groans.

“Are there Kosher options at Chai Pani?” Sirius asks. Remus is floored by this question, because he never expects to be included automatically like that, and never expects anyone to remember his dietary requirements. Thankfully, Teddy is answering for him.

“No, they don’t guarantee anything. We’ve never found an Indian place that does.”

“Wait,” calls Harry from the couch, where he has apparently moved to in the past few minutes, unbeknownst to Remus. How does that boy move so quietly? “Have you had Indian food, ever?”

The look on Harry’s face when both Teddy and Remus shake their heads is so genuinely sad that Remus wants to break Kosher just to cheer him up.

“How about I order sandwiches from the Kosher deli down the street,” Sirius offers, “and then we can address this utter travesty.” He takes everyone’s orders, and steps out to call the deli. Teddy and Harry are bent over Harry’s phone, and Remus hears their very own rendition of “Dancing Shoes” coming through the speakers. Remus hadn’t even noticed Harry filming.

“I’m sending it to the group chat.” Harry phrases it like a statement, but he looks at Teddy for approval before he does anything. Teddy just smiles and nods, and Harry grins back before bending over his phone once again. Both Teddy and Harry’s phones are buzzing incessantly when Sirius walks back in, guitar still slung over her back.

“We have fifteen minutes, let’s do one more song, yea?”

“Can we do-” Marlene is saying, but Sirius has already flipped their guitar to the front of their body and slammed a few chords.

“I’m an alligator,” he sings, and Remus knows, in that moment, that he’s in danger of falling in love with Sirius Black. Her eyes are locked in on Remus’s as she sings, and Remus wastes no time in sliding into the bassline that he’s all too familiar with. The world around them is fading, even as Dorcas and Marlene come in on drums. The way that Sirius leans forward on “I’ll be a rock-and-roll bitch for you,” is mesmerizing, and Remus wants nothing more than to let Sirius be his rock-and-roll bitch.

Sirius is stepping closer and closer to Remus, not even hiding how directly they’re singing to him, and when they reach the chorus, they call out, “sing with me, my Moonage Daydream!” Remus could never say no to that. He’s a weak man at the end of the day.

And so he joins in at the chorus, only vaguely aware of the impressive way that Marlene approximates the piano using her guitar, and the “oos” she sings to accompany them. Remus only sees Sirius’s starry eyes as she stands so close to him that their knuckles are nearly touching. They have to lift their face to see Remus, throwing their cheekbones into sharp relief, and Remus suddenly understands that puddle-feeling that Sirius has been experiencing so frequently.

“Keep your electric eye on me, babe,” they sing, and Remus wants nothing more than for the two of them to stare at each other forever, to feel that electric surge he feels when they make eye contact.

“Put your ray gun to my head,” and Remus feels out of breath when Sirius licks her lips ever so slightly before the next verse.

“Press your space face close to mine, love,” and Christ does Remus want to press his face to Sirius’s, to hear her call him love, delicate and soft.

“Freak out in a moonage daydream, oh yeah,” and yeah, Remus is definitely freaking out.

Sirius gives a little nod, and Remus picks up the second verse. Sirius watches him sing rapturously, like he’s really in the church of man and having a holy experience. Remus himself has never been the type to step into a church, but he imagines divinity would feel something like this.

The second chorus is as magical as the first, maybe even more so, because now Remus is finding a lower harmony to Sirius’s melody, and their voices are blending in a way that is pure magic. Maybe Sirius is secretly a witch, casting a spell over Remus with his voice, her body, their fingers on the guitar strings. Even if that were true, Remus wouldn’t want to stop him. He wants to be caught in Sirius’s web forever, trapped in her galaxy eyes until the stars within them combust.

They move into the instrumental and like before, Marlene is approximating the piano, and now Sirius is mimicking the horns. Remus doesn’t want to stop looking at Sirius, but they’re moving around him now, and he feels glued to the spot. He finds himself staring at the poster of David Bowie instead, and is shocked that, for the first time in his life, he’d rather be staring at someone else. Then, he feels a light pressure on his back, and realizes that Sirius is pressing into him, back to back, as they keep playing. He leans back on instinct, desperate to feel any bit of her body that he can, and he hears a soft sigh as they drop their head so that it rests against his shoulder.

He could die, right then and there, and be so, so unreasonably happy. He’d die with a grin on his face and his heart in his throat and his stomach at his feet, because Sirius is touching him and isn’t that the best feeling on the face of the planet?

Sirius steps away from him for the final two choruses, just to go back to that spot in front of him so they can sing to each other again, and Remus loves the way they throw their head back for those high notes, the way her whole body arcs into her guitar, the way he smiles at him when they make eye contact once again. The final guitar solo is a haze of Sirius, his fingers along the neck of the guitar and her eyes meeting Remus’s. It stretches for a blissful eternity and yet is over all too soon, and Remus feels as if his insides have been pulled out and dunked in a vat of cold water and put back in all jumbled up. He is clean and discombobulated. A new man and a fucking disaster all at once.

He doesn’t really know when they stopped playing, when the room turned to a breathless silence, nothing but the lingering final notes and Sirius’s heavy breathing. She’s pulled her guitar around to her back again, and is somehow even closer than before. Remus can’t stop himself from lifting his hand, catching a stray hair that’s fallen in front of their eyes, tucking it behind their ear. The tips of his fingers brush their cheekbones as he does it, and each point of contact feels like a tiny flame. He leaves his hand there, behind her ear, can’t pull it away, rests his thumb on that soft cheek. He craves more contact, presses his palm to her jaw, and she tilts her chin just so there’s more for him to hold. He is delicate and fierce in Remus’s hand, and Remus wants to feel every contradiction.

“If you’re going to snog, please warn me so I can leave,” comes Teddy’s voice, and Remus and Sirius both jump. Remus had fully forgotten other people were in the room, and based on the blush rapidly filling Sirius’s face, they did too. They both step apart automatically, even though Remus immediately misses the contact.

“No, no,” smirks Dorcas from behind the drumset. “Don’t stop on our behalf.”

“We were just leaving,” teases Marlene, not moving at all.

“Piss off, the both of you,” Sirius says, but they’re still breathless and smiling. Remus hasn’t found his words yet, but he’s saved from having to save anything when Sirius gets a call letting him know the sandwiches are ready.

“I’ll go get them,” she says, and then looks at Remus, a question in her eyes. Remus doesn’t even let them ask it.

“I’ll go with you.”

“If you aren’t back in twenty I’m going to come find you,” Marlene warns. “I refuse to eat a cold sandwich.”

“The shop is literally a block away,” Sirius whines.

“My point stands.” Sirius flips her off as they head to the door, and Remus follows them out into the cold.

The sun has set since Remus arrived a couple hours ago, and they are only lit by intermittent street lights. Sirius presses close to Remus as they walk, and Remus likes to think it’s only a little due to the cold. Remus feels like a teenager again, wondering if he should reach out and hold her hand, wrap his arm around their shoulders.

“Your bass playing is even hotter in person,” Sirius says, breaking the brief silence they’d held. Remus finds himself blushing slightly.

“Could say the same about you playing the guitar. And your voice, while we’re at it.”

“Don’t even start on the voice. Yours is so…raspy.”

“Raspy?”

“Raspy.”

“And that’s…good.”

“It’s really fucking good,” Sirius says, sounding out of breath even though they aren’t walking very fast. Remus feels himself get weak in the knees hearing Sirius talk like that, and he has to lean a little heavier on his cane. It doesn’t slip Sirius’s notice.

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Remus answers, but it comes out a little higher pitched than normal. Sirius grasps his arm, bringing them both to a stop.

“No, really. Are you okay? We can go back and I can walk on my own if you need to.” Remus really is fine, physically, it’s just Sirius being Sirius that has him like this. He also despises when people act like this when he’s just walking, hates looking weak.

“I’m fine,” he says, and it comes out sharper than he intends. Sirius visibly blanches at the tone, pulling back his hand.

“Sorry,” she says, quieter than before.

“No,” Remus says immediately, already feeling guilty. “I’m sorry, I just…I feel fine, really. You just have me all…”

“Out of sorts?” Sirius finishes, grinning. Remus nods, and Sirius steps a little closer, hand coming back up to Remus’s arm.

“Me too,” she breathes, and suddenly they’re back in that electric moment, galaxy eyes and shared breaths, only a couple doors down from the deli. They’re directly underneath a street lamp, and the light shining down highlights those cheekbones again, and the softness of her lips, and Remus finds himself sinking lower just to see them a little better. He feels Sirius’s hand find his waist, pulling ever so gently, and Remus’s hand comes up to find that spot along their jaw again, callused finger against soft cheek, flush with cold.

When their lips meet, it’s as earth-shattering as he thought it would be, and yet intoxicatingly simple all at the same time. Everything breaks around him, his entire world realigning itself to fit Sirius into it, and yet it feels exactly as if this is how it was always supposed to be, as if Sirius was always meant to be here, right here, kissing him under a streetlamp in the cold of December.

Remus reaches his fingers back to thread them deeper into Sirius’s long hair, pulling her chin to find a deeper angle, and Sirius responds by pressing her body closer to Remus’s, and oh somehow this is even better than before. Kissing Sirius is like kissing the universe, and Remus could cry with the overwhelming beauty of it.

They pull back before Remus wants to, and he follows her for a moment, leaning into the kiss. It makes her laugh, a little exhale that Remus wants to capture and keep close to his heart forever.

“Sandwiches,” he says against Remus’s lips, and, right. They’re supposed to be picking up dinner for their friends. He is suddenly aware that he has no idea how long they’ve been snogging under the streetlight, but he’s definitely significantly colder than he was when they left the shop.

Remus decides that, if he’s kissed Sirius, then it’s probably safe to hold her hand, and so he reaches down to grasp it. The soft smile they give when Remus grasps their fingers and gives a squeeze warms him, and he wants to stay under that streetlamp forever just so he never has to let go of Sirius’s hand.

Instead they turn and head into the deli, pick up the sandwiches, and make it back to the shop without another detour. Remus feels like he’s floating the whole way, not held down by gravity but by Sirius beside him. They’re both quiet on this part of the walk, and it just feels correct to hold Sirius’s hand as they take a bag of sandwiches back to their kids, Marlene, and Dorcas.

The knowing looks on everyone’s faces when they reach Marauder’s tells Remus that yes, they were kissing for much longer than they had realized. Thankfully, the sandwiches are still warm, and they all dive in happily without directly addressing the elephant that walked in with Remus and Sirius. They quickly set up their next practice for Friday evening, Teddy happily agreeing to watch the shop again. Harry starts elbowing Teddy then, trying to be subtle and failing entirely. Remus wonders how a child can be so sneaky and yet so bloody obvious at the same time.

“Right,” Teddy says, looking at his dad. “Can I go to the Lions game on Saturday?” Teddy has never cared about football a day in his life, much to Nym’s disappointment, but Remus suspects his sudden interest has something to do with the puppy dog eyes that Harry is currently giving Moony.

“Of course you can,” Remus answers, and both Teddy and Harry give him blinding smiles.

“You’re coming too, Moony. If you’re Sirius’s boyfriend you have to be there.” Remus chokes on his bite of sandwich. Marlene and Dorcas begin snorting with laughter and rush to cover it up, and Sirius is bright red.

“Harry James,” they scold.

“What?!” Harry asks, genuinely curious. “You’re dating now, right?”

“We haven’t actually established anything yet. Or been on an actual date.”

“Oh please,” Harry continues, rolling his eyes. “I’ve got you singing to each other on camera, looking madly in love. I have receipts.”

“Receipts, do you?” Sirius says, rising from his seat beside Remus. “Would be a shame if someone got their phone taken away.”

“You wouldn’t,” says Harry, rising as well and clearly doubting his own words.

“You know I would, Prongslet,” Sirius answers. Remus doesn’t have time to read into the nickname, because Harry is now backing away from the table as Sirius begins to stalk around it. Suddenly Harry screams, sprinting away, and Sirius is charging after him. They race between the shelves, darting this way and that, and Remus would be more concerned if Marlene, Dorcas, and Teddy didn’t look so unbothered by it.

“We’re definitely talking about it, by the way,” Teddy says while Sirius yells something about Harry being a little shit.

“I have a crush on your DM. There. We’ve talked about it.” Teddy rolls his eyes. He’s being good natured, but Remus is starting to feel bad for pushing his son off so much. Teddy genuinely wants to talk about this, and this is the first relationship, the first person at all, even, that’s entering their lives after the death of Teddy’s mother.

“We’ll talk when we get home, cenaw arth,” Remus says, softer now. Teddy tries to look nonchalant when he nods, but Remus can tell he looks a little relieved.

They are interrupted when Harry bursts out from a shelf, panting hard and looking around for Sirius. She emerges from behind a different shelf, and before Harry can sprint away again she has him in her arms. He tries to wrestle away, but their grip is surprisingly strong.

“Show me the video.”

“No.”

“Please.”

That’s all it takes for Sirius’s godson to give in. Harry sighs, going limp in Sirius’s arms. He pulls his phone out of his pocket, a little awkwardly because Sirius has refused to let go of their godson, and plays a video. Sirius’s eyes are immediately fond, and before it’s even finished he’s asking Harry to send it to him. They give Harry a little kiss on the temple, and Harry smiles in spite of himself.

Remus feels his phone vibrate, discovering that Harry has decided to use this moment to create a group chat with himself, Sirius, Remus, and Teddy. It makes Remus’s heart melt a little, just to see their names all together like that.

“Oh, I see, your Cool Lesbian Aunts don’t get the video,” Marlene complains as she balls up her empty sandwich wrapping. Harry looks up to complain but Sirius holds his hand up.

“Too late kid, you’re in the doghouse now.” Harry collapses into a chair, an exaggerated pout on his face, and Remus can’t help but laugh a little at his dramatics.

“I’ll send it in the band chat,” Sirius says to Marlene and Dorcas, and they seem satisfied. Remus is shocked to find his phone vibrating again. Apparently he’s been added to another group chat, this one called “Bandmates who SLAY together STAY together.”

“I’m not in your band,” he says, but before he’s even finished his sentence, Dorcas interrupts him.

“Yes you are.” She says it with such a tone of finality in her voice that Remus can’t even find it within himself to argue. And then, as he looks back at her and Marlene and Sirius, and listens to the sound of him and Sirius singing “Moonage Daydream” still playing from Harry’s speakers, he realizes that he doesn’t want to argue. He wants to be in this little band and play songs and maybe even write them too. Remus feels an odd lifting in his heart, an unfamiliar buoyancy in his chest, and thinks that maybe this happiness he feels will continue, won’t be so goddamn temporary, and oh. Oh. Remus is hopeful. That’s what that feeling is. How unknown and welcome it is, as strange to him as Sirius and yet slotting into his life, his soul, his very being just as perfectly.

It’s a life changing realization to have in the middle of a games shop on a Wednesday night, and it really throws him when the world keeps going on as normal around him. Teddy tries to get Sirius to spoil the events of the campaign, and Harry starts talking football with Marlene and Dorcas, who apologize for not being able to make it to his big game on Saturday. And then suddenly they’re all standing and cleaning the table, and Remus feels as if he’s just re-entered his body.

As they leave the shop, Sirius locking up behind them, Marlene ruffles Teddy’s hair.

“Red next,” she says.

“Yea, because going from blue to red will go great for me.”

“Sirius can do it. She’s the one that bleaches my hair.”

“It’s true,” Sirius says, rejoining the little circle, right next to Remus again. “Name a time and place Teddy, I’ll get you red, no problem.”

“Perfect. Well, I’m freezing my tits off,” Marlene adds, with an accompanying retching noise from Harry. “Let’s go, love.” She and Dorcas head to their car with a wave and calls of “see you Friday.”

Now it’s just the four of them again, Remus and Teddy, Sirius and Harry. Teddy quickly pulls Harry into a conversation, tactfully turning them so that their backs are to Remus and Sirius.

“You know,” Sirius says, suddenly nervous as he looks up at Remus. “If you’d like, you and Teddy can come round after the game on Saturday, have dinner with us.”

“Are you asking me on a date?” Remus replies with a smirk.

“Is that a yes?” Sirius’s eyes are wide and hopeful, and Remus feels himself falling into them. He falls so far, in fact, that he lands on Sirius’s lips, and the kiss they share is as intoxicating as the first.

“That’s a yes,” he whispers when they separate, far too soon for his liking. Sirius is blushing and breathless once again, but she backs up, clearly attempting to regain her composure.

“Yes. Right. Saturday.”

“Saturday.”

“Saturday,” Sirius says again.

“Yes, your first date is on fucking Saturday, can we go?” Harry is bouncing on his feet, looking at Sirius with the kind of exasperation that only a teenager can give. Sirius gives him the finger, before stepping back up to Remus for another kiss. This one is accompanied by the beautiful sounds of Harry yelling “gross” and Teddy making exaggerated gagging noises.

As Sirius pulls away, Remus can hear Harry say to Teddy, quietly: “our dads are gross.” A million emotions pass over Sirius’s face in a single moment, elation and guilt and grief and joy all in one, and then her expression is controlled and pleasant.

“Text me,” she calls over her shoulder, and Remus turns away before he runs over to give them yet another kiss.

Teddy is quiet on the drive home, and Remus knows it’s because he knows the next words out of his mouth will be their talk, and he wants to have this talk on the couch.

**

Twenty minutes later and they’re both in their pajamas, a fresh pot of herbal tea on the coffee table and warm mugs in their hands. They’re mirroring each other, as always, perched on their ends of the sofa, and Remus looks at his son and loves him, loves him with every little piece of his soul. Remus waits for Teddy to speak, knowing there’s something he’s dying to say.

“Do you,” he begins, and then stops abruptly. “How,” and then he stops again. His fingers grip his mug a little tighter, and he huffs out a little sigh.

“It’s okay, take your time.” Remus knows that Teddy gets this way sometimes. He can’t get the words that come out of his mouth to match the thoughts in his head, and it makes him frustrated. All Remus can do is sit with him, let him say the wrong words until the right ones appear, believe him when he says, “that’s not what I mean.”

It takes a couple more starts, but finally he completes a sentence.

“I’m not pressuring you, am I?” Of all the questions Teddy could ask him, Remus isn’t expecting this one.

“No, not at all.”

“You’re sure?”

“Absolutely.”

“Okay.”

“Teddy.” He’s gazing into his tea, but he looks up at his name. He has a pinched expression, like there’s a war in his brain, and knowing Teddy, he probably is. Remus raises his eyebrow. It’s enough to get him talking.

“It’s just, the other day, in the car, and I said…what I did, about Alice. And you said, about matchmaker, and I just. Suddenly you’re texting, and then you hear about Sirius, and then, tonight…” He’s barely coherent to begin with and losing it rapidly, little breaths punctuating each little phrase, short and sharp, while big, soft tears begin to roll down his cheeks.

“Cenaw arth, come here,” Remus says, setting down his mug and extending his arm. Teddy falls forward gratefully, a sob escaping his lips, and for a while Remus just holds his son while he cries into Remus’s chest. Remus rubs his back the way Nym always used to when Teddy got sad, and Remus wishes again that she were here to sing his favorite lullaby and cheer him up in that special way she always managed to do. Remus’s brand of comfort feels inferior in comparison, but he tries his best.

Teddy’s breathing is slowing, moving in time to Remus’s hand on his back. He pulls back, taking a sip from the mug he still has clutched between his hands, and sighs.

“It’s just. You’ve been so happy this week. Since Saturday. You haven’t been happy in so long. You say you’re fine but you haven’t been happy, and this week you finally are, and…” the tears are forming again, but he breathes through them, a determination appearing on his face. He’s going to get this sentence out if it kills him.

“I’m scared it won’t last.”

“Oh baby,” Remus says, as Teddy starts crying again. Remus only calls him that in moments like this, and it makes Teddy cry even harder. Remus reaches out to clutch his shoulders, puts Teddy’s chin in his hand to tilt his face up so that his eyes meet Remus’s again.

“I’m going to be very honest with you, okay?”

Teddy nods, sad and apprehensive.

“It won’t last.” Teddy’s face crumples, and Remus’s heart breaks into smaller pieces than it was in before. “It won’t last, because it never does. We both know it never does.” It’s harsh, and Remus knows it's harsh, but he just has to be honest with Teddy, and Remus is nothing if not pessimistic.

“People leave, in one way or the other, and we can’t do anything to stop it. And it sucks, it fucking sucks,” and Remus feels his own tears forming now, but he keeps a firm grip on Teddy’s chin, steadying both of them, and he grits his teeth and keeps talking. They both need to hear what he’s saying.

“The happiness doesn’t last, and we can never expect it to. But Teddy Bear,” he adds, growing frantic as Teddy continues sobbing into his hand, making it slippery against his son’s face. “The sadness doesn’t last, either. It ebbs and flows the same as the happiness. And maybe it stays for a long time, for years, even, but it goes eventually, and the happiness returns. That’s…that’s life, son.”

It’s a lesson Remus doesn’t want to accept for himself, because all he wants for his child is eternal happiness, for a life without pain or loss. Remus would take on every hurt for Teddy, would make his body a shield and tear himself apart to keep Teddy whole. It kills Remus that he can’t, that no matter what he does Teddy will feel sadness, and pain, and loss, and every other horrible thing that life has to offer. That as little as he wants to, he will also abandon Teddy someday. The thought makes him choke. Death does not scare him, but the idea of leaving his son alone on this planet does.

Teddy is breathing steadier again, but now Remus is a bit of a mess. Teddy sets his own mug down and reaches his arms around Remus’s neck. They stay there for another while, just hugging.

“Have you been worried about me?” Remus asks, and feels Teddy nod against his shoulder.

“I’m sorry,” he says, and means it. “I know I’m not always…open about things. And I don’t think I really knew how sad I was until I wasn’t anymore.”

Teddy breaks the hug, pulls back to look at his dad again.

“But right now the happiness is back, and the sadness is fading a bit. A lot, actually.”

“Do you think mum would like them? Sirius and Harry?” Remus didn’t know the answer to this question until this moment, but finds that he’s nodding and believes it.

“She’d love them.” Remus remembers Sirius chasing Harry around the store, trapping him in a great big hug, and then remembers Nym chasing little toddler Teddy around their Cardiff flat, sweeping him into her arms and blowing a giant raspberry into his stomach. “Sirius reminds me of her, a bit.”

“Me too,” Teddy says softly. “They even look similar. Like they could be cousins, or something.” Remus chuckles, and nods softly, still reminiscing a bit.

“We don’t talk about her enough.”

“Do you want to? Talk about her, I mean?” Remus considers this for a moment.

“I think I do.”

“Me too,” Teddy agrees, and downs the last of his tea. “I don’t think I could, for a while, but. I want to. I don’t want to…to forget anything.”

They have another silent moment, punctuated only by Teddy’s soft sniffles and Remus sipping the last of his tea.

“Do you want a Teddy Bear sandwich tonight?” It’s what he and Nym called sharing a bed when Teddy was growing up. They didn’t share a bed often, but when Teddy was having a bad day, or had a nightmare, they would all pile into Remus’s bed, with Teddy in the middle, and dubbed it a Teddy Bear sandwich.

“More of an open-face sandwich…” Teddy mumbles, half smiling. Remus chuckles a bit.

“An open-face Teddy Bear sandwich, then.”

They settle into Remus’s bed, Teddy’s face lit by his phone as he sends off a couple more texts before bed. Remus checks his own, and is pleased to find that Sirius has texted him, and has also changed his name. Remus does the same to Sirius, smiling.

Rock and Roll Bitch: i had a really nice night

Moonage Daydream: so did i
Moonage Daydream: sweet dreams, my rock and roll bitch <3

Rock and Roll Bitch: good night, my moonage daydream <3

Remus idly plays with Teddy’s hair, and doesn’t drift off until his son’s gentle snores fill the room.

**

Remus is unbelievably anxious all day on Thursday. All he can think about is the fact he will see Sirius ever so briefly when he picks Teddy up from DnD. Molly is once again driving the whole crew to Marauder’s (minus Harry, who has football practice on Thursdays), and Remus doesn’t know what to do with himself until he gets a text from Alice.

Alice RLE: Tea?

Wolf Dad: are you asking me to spill the tea
Wolf Dad: or are you asking me to join you for tea

Alice RLE: I mean both, if I’m honest.
Alice RLE: While our sons are off in a dungeon, or slaying dragons, or whatever is happening over there.

Wolf Dad: dice are involved, somewhere

Alice RLE: Tiny plastic men.

Wolf Dad: silly voices

Alice RLE: In the distance, screams.
Alice RLE: Meet me at Puddifoot’s in 30?

Wolf Dad: sounds good

Alice is already there when he arrives, a little pot of tea in front of her. Remus places his own order, and when he gets to the table, she stands and gives him a hug filled with so much affection it makes him want to cry a little.

“Wolf Dad!”

“Radiant Land Excavator!”

“How are you, dear?” She says, sitting back down and putting her mug to her lips.

“I’m great,” Remus says, and is still shocked when he realizes he means it. “Really great.”

“I can tell,” Alice says. “You’re more chipper than I’ve ever seen you.”

“It’s been a really good week, better than I’ve had for a long time.”

“Tell me about it.”

So Remus does. He talks about how happy he is that Teddy is connecting with their DnD group and Harry. He confesses, a little shyly, how much he’s enjoyed texting Alice this week, and she blushes in response. He talks about Harry, what a joy he is and how much of the world Remus wants to give him. And Sirius. He talks and talks about Sirius. Alice smiles and nods as Remus talks about their meeting, discovering that Sirius is Harry’s godfather, their band practice, the way Sirius hugs Harry, her long hair and his soft skin and their voice, and Alice listens to all of it.

“I’m sorry, I’m talking so much.”

“You’re in love, dear, you’re allowed to talk about it.”

“I- what?” Remus feels like he’s completely see through, or as if Alice has some sort of x-ray vision.

“I said you’re in love. You don’t have to call it that yet if you don’t want to, but it’s true.” Remus doesn’t know what to say to that, and Alice simply moves on, content to let that line of conversation end in favor of another. They chat then about her, and her husband, and Neville, and when they leave to pick up their sons from the Marauder’s Remus is feeling soft and content, though still a bit vulnerable.

Seeing Sirius is breathtaking, again, and Remus wonders if it will ever not be. He stands from his chair the moment Remus walks in, and then flushes with embarrassment when she realizes just how eager she appears. Fred and George are casting knowing glances between the pair of them, and when Alice winks at Neville and Cho they both giggle.

Remus manages to find an excuse to stay until he and Teddy are the last ones left at the shop, one which Alice sees right through. She smirks at Remus as she leaves with Neville and Cho, but says nothing. Molly is a tornado, once again, but a temporary one.

Again, Remus and Sirius stand facing each other in front of Marauder’s. Teddy is already in Remus’s car, burying his face in his phone. Again, Remus gets to bend down and let his lips press against Sirius’s, to taste her. He holds their waist, and they run their fingers through his curls, and the feel of it makes him shiver. He grips Sirius tighter, pulls him closer against him, and then-

“I’m hungry!” Teddy calls, before slamming the door closed again. Sirius chuckles, and Remus does too, and then they’re both giggling with their foreheads pressed together, faces flush and lips wet.

They text almost constantly over the next day and a half. They talk about books they like, argue over music preferences, send each other memes that they both got from Teddy or Harry first. Sirius talks about his art and Remus talks about his writing. Remus is as bad as his students, checking his phone between every class period just to read what Sirius has sent him, sends a quick reply of his own. They only stop when they’re together at band that evening, and even then Marlene eventually finds them so unbearable that she threatens to lock them in the band room together until “you get it all out of your systems.”

She does not, in fact, lock them in the practice room, and quite frankly Remus thinks he could stay in a locked room with Sirius until the end of all things and never get it all out of his system, but they do their best to be a bit less…into each other for the rest of the evening. Still, his entire night ends up hinging around that lovely little kiss they share, in front of the shop, being aggressively ignored by their sons.

Remus finds himself begging Teddy to help him pick a jumper on Saturday morning, and Teddy teases him relentlessly before picking a bright red one that he doesn’t wear so often.

“For the Lions,” he says. Right. Harry. Football.

It’s already packed when they arrive, and Remus has to park in a patch of grass rather than an actual spot. Teddy is literally jumping with excitement, and Remus assures him that, yes, it’s okay if you run up ahead. When Remus reaches the pitch, he sees Teddy surrounded by a group of boys in red and gold uniforms, thick horizontal stripes with numbers emblazoned on the back. Teddy sticks out, not only for his hair and clothes but for his height, towering above even the Year 13s on the team. He’s giving Harry’s shoulder a reassuring squeeze, and Harry is looking up at him with that wide-eyed face of admiration.

The crowd gathered around is split in half, with one side decked out in red and gold and the other in green and silver. There is a thick tension between the two sides, and Remus quickly makes his way over to the Lion’s section, scanning the crowd for Sirius. He spots a gaggle of redheads first, Molly with some older boys that can only be Ron, Fred, and George’s eldest brothers. He spots Ginny next, standing with the other kids that frequent Moony’s lunchtimes. Seamus and Dean are holding a banner that features an incredibly realistic lion.

“Moony!” he hears, and turns to find Sirius at the very front of the crowd wearing a gold shirt and what looks like Marlene’s red leather jacket. They’ve painted Harry’s number on their cheek, a bright red 7 that gets all distorted when they smile widely. Remus wants to kiss them right then, make her cheeks so red that the 7 disappears, but he’s very aware that there are multiple of his students now enthusiastically calling his name, and so instead he pulls Sirius into his arms for a close, but still arguably friendly hug.

Sirius is bouncing nearly as much as Teddy as they instantly launch into some explanation of the team’s strengths and weaknesses, how the Snakes are looking today. Remus, thanks to Harry’s lunch time rants of a similar nature, is able to follow fairly well as he gazes down at the team. Teddy has left and is heading towards Neville, sitting behind the row of Moony’s students, and Harry has moved over to where Ron is standing, off to the side with Hermione. Ron looks like he’s two minutes away from vomiting, and Harry is clearly giving an enthusiastic pep talk that Ron is not really paying attention to. Then, Hermione reaches out and squeezes his hand, and a bit of color comes back into Ron’s cheeks, and suddenly he’s nodding along with Harry like he might actually believe whatever lovely things his friend is telling him.

Then one of the oldest boys on the team, Remus is fairly sure he’s Oliver Wood, the captain, is shooing Hermione off, gathering the team around him. Molly’s husband Arthur stands nearby, looking more like an enthusiastic fan than a coach, and Remus gets the sense that the title is more honorary than anything and really it’s Oliver that’s running the show here.

Before Remus knows it, both teams are taking the field, cheers and jeers from both sides in equal measure. Sirius is already screaming, and Remus knows it won’t be long until they’re hoarse. A referee blows a whistle, and the game commences. Remus learns that Harry is something called a striker, which has something to do with being someone that scores a lot of goals. Draco Malfoy is the striker for the Snakes, which keeps the two of them far apart, but somehow they still find ways to sneer at each other from across the field.

The game is as intense as Remus had anticipated. They are fairly evenly matched. The Snake’s offense is rather good, from what Remus can gather, but Fred and George make excellent defenders. When Ron, crouched in the goal, makes his first save of the match, Sirius visibly relaxes. Apparently Ron’s whole game depends on whether he makes that first save or not. Sure enough, when a ball cuts through Fred and George’s defense, Ron stops it nearly every time. On the other side of the field, Harry is a madman. He’s constantly on the ball whenever it’s within his vicinity, and if the Snake’s goalie weren’t so good he’d have an impressive number of goals. When the ball’s at the other end of the field, Harry stays laser focused, calling out encouragement and warnings and taunting Draco back when he gets a chance.

The first goal that Harry makes, an impressive shot into the corner of the goal, has Sirius literally leaping out of his seat, likely ruining the video she is taking, joining in the enthusiastic “Potter! Potter!” chant with all the students and a fair number of adults, who appear to be nearly as into this match as the kids. Remus never knew kids’ sports could get so intense, and feels incredibly grateful that this is not Teddy’s hobby of choice. Still, there’s something magical about the moment when Ron makes a big save, and the entire Lion’s crowd cheers, and Sirius clutches Remus’s arm and shakes him with vigor.

It nearly comes to blows between the two teams multiple times, and it takes the intervention of the referee and both coaches to ease the tension before it reaches a breaking point. Remus is also fairly sure that a fight will break out between the parents, especially as they enter the final bit of stoppage time tied at 1-1. Remus feels his heart rise into his throat as Harry takes possession of the ball, out maneuvering defenders that tower over him, and feels a scream leave his throat when he takes his shot.

When he makes it, the roar of the crowd, as well as Sirius’s scratchy scream, is deafening. The referee’s whistle signifying the end of the match is barely heard above the crowd, and Harry sprints around the field, chased by his teammates, an expression of pure joy on his face. He lets himself be pat on the back for a moment, before he squeezes out of the little huddle of players around him to find Sirius in the crowd.

Harry collides into Sirius’s open arms, and Sirius uses the momentum to lift him and spin, laughing and screaming with his kid, and Remus thinks it’s the cutest thing he’s ever seen. Then, the most unexpected thing happens. Harry finds his feet and is now sprinting directly for Remus, shouts of “Moony, Moony, we won!” Remus is glad that he has time to prepare, because Harry does not hold back when he smacks into Remus, squeezing him round the middle.

Remus is laughing as he hugs Harry back, because the way Harry cares for others is so genuine and enthusiastic and overwhelming that he just can’t help it. Harry lets go to look up at Remus, face still wide open, and Remus can’t help the fatherly instincts that take hold of him. He grabs Harry’s shoulder, looks him in the eye.

“I’m so proud of you, kid.”

If Harry was joyful before, he’s ecstatic now, and he hugs Remus around the middle again, squeezing tight.

“Thanks, Moony! Love you!”

Remus’s whole world tilts on its axis as he watches Harry sprint away towards the Weasley family. It’s not like Wednesday night, when everything fell apart and reassembled itself. More like his life is the same as it has been, except he has this new perspective, switched out a pair of glasses for ones with a better prescription, some newfound clarity. Harry loves him, and fuck, does he love Harry back. Harry fits into his life as much as Sirius does, had already nestled a little place there by the time Remus met Sirius. Remus could cry with the realization that he loves every single part of that little kid with the scar on his face and a heart as big as the sun.

Remus is barely functional when Sirius jogs back to him after giving Fred and George enthusiastic congratulations, and she wastes no time in grabbing Remus by the back of the neck and pulling him down to kiss her. Remus feels like his feet have found the earth again, gravity’s caught hold of him once more, and suddenly the joy he’s feeling has nowhere to go but out. He grabs hold of Sirius’s waist, pulls him so close in order to kiss him more fiercely that Sirius lifts him off the ground a bit, and Sirius’s other hand reaches up to cling onto Remus’s shoulder. Remus sets them down again, separating just a bit, and is aware of a couple whoops and whistles coming from the direction of his students. So much for keeping things private. Remus can’t bring himself to feel upset about it, too giddy with victory and Sirius and Harry.

It’s a long while after the match before they’re anywhere close to leaving. Remus is accosted at one point by Pavarti and Lavender, demanding to know whether he and Sirius are dating. Remus, still feeling bold and buoyant, wraps his arm around Sirius’s shoulder and answers proudly.

“He’s my girlfriend.” The elated blush on Sirius’s face makes it worth it, and Pavarti and Lavender mumble something about them being cute before they race back over to their little group of friends, giggling and gossiping.

They walk back to the parking lot, Remus’s arm still on Sirius’s shoulder and Sirius’s arm around Remus’s waist, and the last thing he wants to do is separate. Sirius texts him the address to their house, and as they pull away, Remus holds on tighter, keeping them there.

“Was that okay? Earlier?” Remus really should have clarified their relationship before loudly declaring Sirius to be his in front of his students, but he had been a bit swept up in the moment.

“Are you asking if I’ll be your boyfriend?”

Remus smiles as he responds, “is that a yes?”

Reversing their roles from Wednesday, Sirius stands on her tiptoes to kiss Remus, soft and sweet. They pull back only just, so that their lips still graze Remus’s when they respond, “that’s a yes.”

Remus is pretty sure he floats back to his car, that Teddy drags him along like a balloon, his feet never touching the ground.

Teddy falters for a moment when they reach the car, looking quizzically at his dad. “You, er, good to drive there, Da?”

Remus has to physically shake himself out before he can safely say yes, he can drive, and is further grounded when Teddy spends the entire ten minute trip teasing him relentlessly about his new girlfriend. Remus can’t even be mad, happy as he is. Has he ever been this happy? When Teddy was born, when Teddy called him “Da” the first time, when Teddy said “I love you” for the first time. Those are the comparable moments, Remus thinks.

Remus pulls into the driveway of a single family home, a little larger than he’d expect for just the two of them. Remus has brought a bottle of wine, because it feels like the right thing to do when you go to your girlfriend’s (!!!) house for the first time. He clutches it tightly in his hands as he and Teddy step onto the little front porch, knocking at the bright yellow door.

Sirius opens it almost instantly, as if they were waiting beside the door. Remus gets that swooping feeling in his stomach at the sight of her, even though he only just saw them ten minutes ago. Sirius looks like they feel much the same way.

“Absolutely not,” comes Teddy’s voice, actively pushing Sirius back into their own home. “We are going inside before you start getting all lovey-dovey.”

Sirius rolls his eyes forcefully, but settles for kissing Remus’s cheek as they pull the wine bottle from his hands. They step through a little entryway into a cozy living room, a comfortable-looking sectional with a handmade looking knit blanket in a crumpled heap in the corner, shelves of books interspersed with tchotchkes and art pieces, and, Remus’s favorite, a gorgeous record player with a vinyl collection stored on a shelf beneath it. There are photos everywhere: adorning the walls, sitting on shelves, in little boxes on the coffee table. Remus wants to look at everyone, but he’s already being drawn around the corner to the kitchen, where Sirius is pulling out chopping boards and knives.

Harry is showering, but Sirius quickly enlists Teddy in the chopping of a myriad of vegetables to occupy him. Sirius’s voice is hoarse and scratchy as he and Teddy chat more about the game, how excellently Harry played, Sirius only interrupting to give Teddy some new instruction, or insisting for the millionth time that no, Remus is not allowed to help no matter how much he wants to.

“And this will be completely Kosher,” she promises again. “I bought new pots and knives and things just to make sure we didn’t use something for both meat and dairy, and they’re in two different colors so we always know they’re safe and which one is which for next time…” Sirius keeps rambling as she unstoppers the wine bottle, something about the Kosher section of the grocery store and the very lovely woman that helped him, and Remus can’t stop their rambling until he steps behind them, wraps his arms around them, bends over so he can kiss her cheek and whisper in her ear.

“You did wonderfully.” Sirius finally stops then, and they stand there together in the kitchen, reveling in the domesticity of it all, the promises of future meals together. It’s how Harry finds them, and he feels no shame in walking right up and interrupting them with a hug of his own. His wet hair is flat against his head, the neatest that Remus has ever seen it, and Remus hugs him back and just lets himself feel loved for a moment, openly and without complication.

Harry starts pulling out various ingredients and works on preparing some sort of dough that he explains is for roti, and when Teddy is finished chopping vegetables he is ushered away, told to go put on some music. Soon the kitchen is filled with the smell of sauteing onions, the sound of Arctic Monkeys (Teddy chose the music, after all), and a feeling of comfort and closeness.

It should feel new, Remus thinks, sipping his wine. It should feel strange and different to be in an unfamiliar home, with food he’s never eaten before being cooked, with people he’s known less than a year, less than a week, and yet. Remus is utterly content, relaxed as if it were his own home, comfortable with the moments of silence that come and go naturally between lines of conversation. The scene feels complete in a large and mysterious, and yet utterly simple way. It’s the four of them, at home, together, and it’s how things have always been meant to be.

Before long, Sirius and Harry are bringing dish after dish to the table, curries and rice and roti and a fried okra dish called kurkuri bhindi. They dive in, and as they eat, they start sharing stories. Harry talks about his parents, about how he can feel disconnected from his dad’s culture easily, and how hard Sirius tries to keep it a part of their lives. Sirius tells stories of Harry’s parents from their childhoods, hinting at all the ways James and Lily both saved his life in one way or the other. Teddy, in turn, starts talking about his mum, about her laugh and her voice and the bruises that always adorned her shins from how often she’d bang them against some piece of furniture or another. Remus talks about her too, about their instant friendship and the speculation that followed them their whole lives. He talks, with tears in his eyes, about the day Teddy was born, and then Sirius is telling him about holding Harry for the first time, and she’s crying too, and Teddy and Harry are rolling their eyes at each other but smiling while they do so.

Remus helps Sirius with the dishes when they’re done, the two of them bumping hips while the distinctive sound of Mario Kart can be heard from the living room. They take their time washing and drying and putting them away, and if they take a few extra minutes to kiss softly against the counter, who has to know?

Sirius insists on an official tour of the house. It’s definitely larger than they really need, but Sirius explains that, despite being disowned as a teenager, his favorite (and probably gay) uncle left him a huge pile of money when he died. Sirius had never really known what to do with it, until James and Lily died, and then he used it to buy a new home for him and Harry, one they could live in forever and fill with new, happy memories.

And fill the home they have. Sirius and Harry each have their own bedrooms, but they also each have a bonus room beyond that. Harry’s looks like a second living room, with multiple gaming systems hooked up to a tv, a decent sized table and a wall of board games. Sirius’s extra room, on the other hand, is essentially an art studio. Teddy looks like he wanted to melt on the spot the moment the door opened, but instead he wanders the room, bouncing from canvas to canvas, standing in awe at the overflowing closet of paints and brushes and mediums. Remus wants to stand in there all day too, to comb over every portrait. Many of them feature someone that looks like a grown up Harry, someone Remus now recognizes to be James. There is one in particular that catches Remus’s eye, of James with his head thrown back in laughter, a familiar looking grin on his face, with lilies woven in his curly, messy hair.

Soon Harry is tugging on Teddy’s arm, demanding that he sees Harry’s Pokemon card collection, and Teddy has never been into Pokemon cards but he follows Harry anyways, leaving Sirius and Remus alone in the studio, staring at the portrait of James. Sirius presses into Remus’s side, and Remus wraps his arms around her.

“Harry adores him,” he says, quietly.

“Teddy loves him back,” Remus answers, just as soft. Then, “this is beautiful.”

Sirius nods.

“He was beautiful,” he says, and then they’re quiet again.

They’re quiet and soft for a while after that. Sirius opens a second bottle of wine while Remus puts on another record, and they sit on the couch, sharing the corner, and they talk. They talk about grief and loss and parenthood. They talk about Harry and Teddy. Remus talks about the queer community Harry has organized nearly single handedly, his comical obsession with Draco Malfoy, his deep sadness and brilliant joy. Sirius talks about Teddy’s brilliant mind, his quick wit and protective instinct, his ease and grace in complex social situations. Remus can see the love he has for Teddy reflected back in Sirius’s eyes, can see that every soft feeling he has for Harry is mirrored in Sirius, towards Teddy.

“Our kids are fantastic, aren’t they?”

“Our kids…” Sirius repeats back, those many emotions flickering behind her eyes again, but slower this time. Maybe from the softness of the moment, maybe from the wine.

“What was that?”

“What was what?”

“What’s happening in your brain right now?” Remus asks, reaching his hand to press his thumb to Sirius’s temple. They lean into the contact, letting Remus’s other fingers slide into their hair.

“Thinking of him as my kid. Not my godson, just…my son.” He says the word with a special kind of reverence, one usually reserved for deities and royalty and the vast mysteries of the universe.

“You love him like he’s yours,” Remus states, because it’s true. Sirius looks at Harry the way Remus knows he looks at Teddy. Harry is Sirius’s entire world, the thing he rotates around.

Sirius only nods again.

“James always called me his third parent. I lived with them, so I was practically raising Harry alongside them, even before they…” Sirius fades out. They hate saying the word, saying what happened to his best friends. Remus stays quiet, lets Sirius think through her words the way he always lets Teddy do.

“He called me Dad the other night,” she finally says, staring very intently into her nearly empty wine glass. “Not Pads, Dad. Just came in to give me a hug good night, said ‘Love you, Dad,’ like it was nothing, and left. Like he didn’t even notice.”

“How’d you feel?” Remus asks, refilling both his and Sirius’s glasses.

“Good. Really good. And then, really fucking bad. Because I can’t, I’m not-” he stops speaking suddenly, some feeling clogging up his throat, making his breath come out in little wheezing bursts. Remus doesn’t hesitate in grabbing her neck, pulling them into his chest, running his fingers through her hair, until their breathing steadies.

“I can’t replace him, Moony,” Sirius exhales. “I’m not James, and I’m certainly not Lily.” Remus tugs at her shoulder, just enough so that Sirius pulls back to look up at Remus.

“He knows that, cariad,” the term of endearment slipping out before Remus even has a chance to catch it. Sirius inhales a little at the word. “Harry knows exactly who you are, and he called you Dad anyways.”

“I can’t replace-” Sirius starts to say again, but Remus cuts her off.

“You aren’t. Harry is allowed to have two Dads. Hell, he’s allowed to have as many as he wants. Lord knows he deserves it.” Sirius is visibly relaxing into Remus now, leaning her shoulder into the spot where Remus is clutching it.

“He deserves the world, and you give it to him.”

Sirius looks up at him then, intent clear on her face, and they waste no time in falling into a kiss, deep and slow. Remus pulls the wine glass from Sirius’s hands without breaking the kiss, setting both of their glasses on the coffee table beside them. They take full advantage of their now available arms, wrapping each other in a tight embrace as they lean into that cozy little corner spot. Remus can’t stop touching Sirius’s face, holding her close as he can. He loves the way he can feel Sirius’s breaths against his own chest, hear their quiet inhales. Remus wants to bathe in all his little noises, wrap himself in their smell, earthy and herbal. He wants to explore every little piece of Sirius there is, to rejoice in the vision of weeks, months, maybe even years of time he can spend learning her.

Remus decides to start right then, with Sirius’s face. He moves his thumb so that it wraps around Sirius’s chin, pushes it ever so gently to the side, lets his mouth wander the soft expanse of his cheek, the sharp line of her jaw. They let out a content little hum, and it’s more beautiful than any piece of music could ever be.

“Call me what you called me earlier,” he whispers. “That Welsh word.”

“You’re so beautiful, cariad,” Remus answers, hardly more than a breath, into the little hollow where their jaw meets their neck. Sirius grabs Remus’s face then, brings it back so that their lips can meet once more.

Remus doesn’t know how long they stay like this, gentle kisses on the couch and forgotten wine glasses, but the record is skipping and their lips are swollen when Teddy and Harry’s voices are suddenly much, much louder.

“Let’s walk into the living room, Harry,” Teddy is saying, extremely loudly.

“What an excellent idea, Teddy,” Harry responds, laughter in his voice. “Let’s go right now.”

“I agree, Harry. Let’s walk down the hallway now.” Remus opens his eyes to stare into Sirius’s, his own amusement echoed in their face.

“How many more steps d’you reckon, Teddy?”

“Oh, I’d say about-”

“It’s safe,” Remus calls, and then, to himself and Sirius, adds, “Christ.”

Harry and Teddy walk in moments later, saying something about popcorn and a movie, apparently unphased by the sight of their dads curled up extremely closely on the couch. Ten minutes later and they’re all piled there together, Remus and Sirius wrapped in one blanket and Teddy and Harry in another. Remus and Sirius have gotten especially giggly, something to do with all the wine, to the extent that even Harry is getting annoyed, but somewhere in the giddiness Remus slips out of consciousness, knowing only the feel of Sirius at his side, the comforting presence of Teddy and Harry, and knowing, above all else, that he is content to be here, with his family.

The next thing that Remus is aware of is Teddy gently waking him up, wishing him good night, of Sirius pulling out some old pajamas that used to belong to James for both him and Remus. He’s fairly sure a sleepover wasn’t the plan for the evening, but now he’s climbing into a big, warm bed, pulling Sirius close to him, and then he doesn’t remember anything else until a bright light is shining in through a window, a sharp headache hitting his temples. A warmth and a weight beside him, unfamiliar and known all at once.

Sirius in the morning is a sight to behold, half lidded and messy haired, but Remus doesn’t even get to appreciate it before Harry bursts into the room, pursued by Teddy. Harry takes one look at the groggy pair in Sirius’s bed before plopping himself right between them, loudly demanding attention and breakfast, in that order.

“Fuck, Harry, do you have to talk so loud?” Sirius groans, voice hardly more than a whisper, resting her arm over her eyes to block the light.

“Don’t know what you’re talking about,” Teddy answers instead, also extremely loudly, throwing himself between Sirius and Harry. Sirius glares at him, before catching Remus’s eye from underneath their arm.

“Our sons are bloody nightmares, aren’t they?” The grin that crosses Harry’s face is breathtaking, but is quickly followed by a mischievous smirk. He elbows Teddy in the ribs, who yelps in surprise and pokes Harry hard in the side. There is a little scramble then, both of the boys knocking into Remus and Sirius until Remus is holding onto Harry and Sirius is holding onto Teddy, both kids laughing much too loudly for either adult’s liking.

“Our dads are annoying, huh?” Harry says to Teddy.

Later, they’ll get up and make breakfast. Sirius will spend all day dying Teddy’s hair red and then facetime Marlene with the results. Even later, Remus will start giving Harry lessons on the bass while Sirius and Teddy paint in Sirius’s studio. Much, much later, Sirius will present Remus and Teddy with keys to the house, and Remus and Teddy will move just two weeks later. That night, Remus will hear Teddy and Harry refer to each other as brothers for the first time and he’ll cry onto Sirius’s shoulder. Later than that, Sirius will present Remus with Ziggy Stardust on vinyl, found by Remus’s Record Locator Extraordinaire, and they will spend the evening lounging in their living room listening to it over and over. And, even later than that, on a cold December night much like the one with the streetlamp and the deli sandwiches, Remus will ask Sirius to marry him and Sirius will kiss him and Remus will ask if that’s a yes. It will be.

For now though, Remus lies in Sirius’s bed with a hangover, their children pressed between them. He knows that realistically happiness will not stay with him forever, but he thinks, maybe, that this time it could.