Chapter Text
Welcome to Godric’s Hollow, Devon
Population: 1,023
Sirius Black sighed and stubbed his cigarette out against the sign on the outskirts of the town. It looked well cared for and he almost wished he hadn’t for a moment, but then, a little cigarette ash never hurt no one. Besides, the sight of such a gaudy little sign made him antsy for the excitement of London, or at least Hogsmeade, but unfortunately, here they were, in Godric’s Hollow, Devon, Population 1,023, and every one of them squares. At least this place didn’t have a lousy motto like Always Faithful or For God and Queen, or worse, some Mickey-Mouse slogan like Never Tickle a Sleeping Dragon. Really, what kind of whack-job made that a motto for a town?
Sirius glanced over to James, who was leaning against Sirius’ motorbike rolling another cigarette. “This is the place, right?” Off James’ shrug, Sirius cupped a hand around his mouth and called back to Gideon Prewett, who was coming up the road into town on his own bike. “This is the place, Gid? The mechanic’ll help, eh?”
Gideon nodded, slowed down without getting off his bike and pulled the bandana from the lower half of his face. “Yeah, this is the place.” He glanced over to his twin brother Fabian for confirmation, and when he received it with a short nod, carried on further into the town. Caradoc followed, James’ bike thrown on a makeshift trailer behind him. James watched his pride and joy pass with a downward twist of his mouth, and Sirius itched with the urge to get to the mechanic as soon as possible, his blood brother needed his sodding bike back in tip-top condition yesterday. The joint rider-in-chief of the Marauders with no bike was like a racehorse with three legs. Then, once that was fixed, they needed to go and get their own back on the pieces of work that made James total his bike in the first place. First things first, though.
Sirius slung a leg over his bike and James settled behind him as the rest of the Marauders rode past. They had pulled aside after going ahead to blow off a bit of steam and really give the engine a good run-around, but now the others had caught up, it was back to business. “Better not take too long to get your bike fixed,” Sirius muttered, kicking the engine to life and starting down the road.
Sirius felt James nod behind him. “Yeah, better be something fun to do whilst we wait.”
The further they rode into the town, the less likely that seemed. Sirius should’ve known by the population numbered on the sign, but it still surprised him. There was a church, a small hall and a coffee bar - the adjacent car park had one car parked there - and it all looked disgustingly drab and grey and one step away from ceasing to exist entirely. Seemed like they’d have to make their own fun whilst they were waiting for James’ repairs.
The rest of the gang had pulled into the car park, sprawling bikes and shining metal under the afternoon sun, with Bones and Caradoc sent ahead to speak to Pettigrew, the mechanic who was a friend of a friend of a friend.
Sirius took a moment to look around at his family, his blood brothers and sisters, with his heart roaring of possessive pride. Gid and Fab, the twins with the flaming red hair, ripped leather jackets and scratcher tattoos, strolled to the edge of the car park to look up and down the street, already displeased with the quiet. Marlene and Dorcas, the former already tipping her head back to the sun, bandana tied around her golden hair, the latter wearing her chocolate skin like a badge of resistance, like the embodiment of everything counter-culture in a land of pasty-white squares. Caradoc Dearborn, tall and proud and stern, with wit quicker than his bike and the knowledge to back it up, and Edgar Bones, with more criminal connections than the London Underground, were both sent ahead to bargain for James’ baby to be fixed up.
Sirius killed the engine and climbed off his bike, shucking his leather jacket off in the heat and swinging it over his shoulder by the collar. James stepped off next to him, adjusting his thick-rimmed glasses before sliding a hand through his hair to set it back in place. Sirius glanced down the road, looking to the twins, who nodded back. “Eaters didn’t follow us?”
Fabian paused to straighten a twist in the leg of his jeans. “Nah, bettin’ the Fuzz caught up with them.”
“Yeah.” Sirius nodded towards the coffee bar. “Shall we?” He lit a cigarette and scuffed a piece of dried mud from his boots against the car park wall, before starting up the steps to the coffee bar. He saw, with a grin forming, that the place seemed fairly busy, and every single one of the patrons was staring at the new arrivals, all slicked hair, leather jackets and heavy boots. The roar of the motorcycles were impossible to miss in a town this sleepy. Sirius’ grin widened as he pushed the door open.
The place - Evans’s, according to the sign outside - was quiet, except for the jukebox in the corner, and every person within had their nosy gaze trained on the newcomers who simply strolled to a booth and sat down. It was a typical coffee bar, a counter along one edge with two pretty looking girls behind - if you liked that kind of thing - and a row of stools for anyone who wanted to sit at the bar. The rest of the space was taken up with booths, bright red cushions and gold trim, mostly full of teenagers a few years younger than Sirius, a few adults here and there, but this was obviously the best - and only - place to hang out in Godric’s Hollow.
Sirius stretched his arms over his head before snatching up a menu to peer at, thoroughly enjoying the way the conversation came back slowly - hushed whispers, angry mutterings from the old folks, a flutter of giggles from a group of girls at the bar. James lit a cigarette and looked around, entirely intrigued by this little town.
Lily Evans looked on the group of greasers sat in the booth with ill-concealed disgust. “Go and serve them, Lily,” she muttered to herself, mimicking her fathers’ hushed tones in the kitchen. “We don’t want any trouble, Lily. Just keep them happy, Lily.”
She threw her cloth into the sink and grabbed the notepad from her apron pocket, sliding the pencil from behind her ear in the same motion. Rolling her eyes to her friends sat at the end of the bar, Lily forced on her fake-smile and bounced up to the table, ponytail swinging. “What can I get you folks?”
Green eyes swept over the group, four guys, all in leathers with slicked hair and sharp smiles, and two girls in jeans and leather jackets, one of them dark-skinned and smiling dangerously as if daring Lily to say anything about it. Lily swiftly looked away, to the blonde with her arm tightly around the other girls waist, then looked away again to two identical men with ginger hair and tattoos, the thinner one rolling a cigarette. She looked away again and her eyes met with a tall, dark-haired boy staring at her from behind thick-rimmed glasses. He looked completely stunned until the boy next to him elbowed him viciously in the ribs.
The longer-haired boy, all sharp angles and knife-like cheekbones, gave Lily a disarming smile that she felt entirely immune to. “Hello dolly,” he drawled, sucking on a cigarette. “I’ll take a milkshake, strawberry, and my brother James here’ll take whatever you wanna give him by the looks of it.” He smiled lasciviously and shot Lily a wink.
His friend, James apparently, grinned stupidly and ran a hand over his slicked hair. “Yeah, that’ll be right, whatever you want, baby.”
Lily swallowed back a snort of offended laughter and tried not to let her lips curl back. She turned to the others, one eyebrow raised a little, and took their orders too. She barely paid attention though, inwardly fuming at the stupid grin of the taller boy, his gaze burning through her. Things like this never happened in Godric’s Hollow. Everyone was kind and respectful because she was an Evans and they were a pillar of the community and of course this bloody greaser gang had to come through and ruin things, just like all greasers did. They had to deal with the Eaters when they rolled through, and now these upstarts. Feeling the flush rising in her cheeks, Lily stepped back from the table with their orders and set about making drinks. If she were a lesser girl, Lily might’ve considered spitting in them, but that was just lowering herself to their level.
“You alright Lily?” Remus asked, leaning over from his seat at the bar, pushing his milkshake aside to lower his voice, Peter leaning in next to him. Lily could feel the blush in her cheeks and willed it away as if her circulatory system would bow to her demands alone.
“Fine,” Lily replied, mixing the milkshakes and pouring lemonade. “Those greasers, that’s all.”
“Want me to get your father?” Peter asked, swirling the straw around the bottom of his glass to get the last of his own lemonade. Remus had actually looked up from his book, warm brown eyes flickering between the booth and Lily behind the counter.
Lily shrugged, setting a few of the drinks onto a tray. “He knows they’re here. Told me to serve them so we don’t get any trouble.”
Remus peered at the list of drinks on the notepad, worrying his bottom lip between his teeth. “Want me to come and help out?”
Lily shook her head. “No, it’s alright. Hopefully they’re just here for one drink and a bit to eat, then they’ll ride off into the bloody sunset again.” Petunia came out of the kitchen a moment later with a tray of food on her hip for another table. Lily caught her on the way back to the kitchen and slipped the greasers food order into her pocket. “Tunie, take this through to Dad for me? For those greasers.”
Petunia glanced at the table, all of its occupants now smoking cigarettes and laughing raucously at some joke, probably at someone else’s expense. “Ugh, what are they doing here?”
“Lord knows.” Lily shifted the tray of drinks up onto her arm. “Just hope they clear off soon.”
Petunia gave the gang in the booth one last withering look before ducking back into the kitchens to retrieve the next order. Lily sighed and made her way through the tables to their booth. Ignoring James’ ridiculous leering, she set the drinks down in front of each of them, straightening up with a small smile when she left the space in front of the bespectacled boy empty.
James quirked an eyebrow above his glasses, his stupid grin still in place, as if he were expecting something other than a drink and it made Lily seethe.
“Sorry.” Lily smiled, a little less fake that time. “Thought you said you’d take whatever I’ve got for you. Turns out that’s nothing at all, baby.”
The table was silent for a moment before it erupted into laughter, the longer-haired boy slapping his palm on the table a few times, one of the red-headed twins throwing his head back into a howl. The whole table were laughing, except James, who looked a little embarrassed and affronted all at once. Lily hid a smile and turned back, skirt twirling around her ankles.
She flounced back to the bar to find Peter and Remus smiling behind their glasses. Remus gave her a soft smile before his gaze slid past to the table, laughter still echoing.
Remus Lupin’s specialist skill was blending in to the background. He made it his mission not to be seen unless it was explicitly necessary - which happened to be not very often at all. Perhaps it came from living in a small town where everyone knew everyone else’s business, or perhaps it came from being the local Police Chief’s son, or perhaps it came from having a chronic illness that had some fairly obvious physical symptoms every now and again.
So Remus wasn’t surprised when the greaser gang stepped into Evans’s, all bright eyes looking and judging, and swept over him entirely. Godric’s Hollow was boring as anything, a quiet town, with one crossroad, and Evans’s was the only place that was anything to hang out. Most young people saw sense and moved to Hogsmeade - a big town a few miles away - as soon as they could. But Remus was still here, as were Peter and Lily, his two best friends, as well as a few friends from school. Peter’s dad was the town mechanic. He tended to draw people from a few towns over - sometimes nearly all the way to Hogsmeade - so he was pretty well known for his affinity with the machines. Lily and her sister were an important part of town too, seeing as they were Evanses - and Lily had been May Queen the last year of school.
But Remus preferred to slink into the background. True, his father was the Police Chief, but that just meant Remus wanted to slide by without incident all the more. He’d earned enough attention in school for being a Lupin to last him a lifetime.
Sad to say, greasers were a regular fixture in the Hollow - a group of them came through occasionally, nasty pieces of work that called themselves the Death Eaters, causing havoc, damaging property and starting fights. It always took the town a few weeks to recover from them whenever they came rolling through - things needed repairing, repainting, removing and people needed to catch their breath. Remus hoped these newcomers would keep to themselves and, as Lily said, get some food and move on.
So why was he staring?
Why was he staring at one of them in particular, with black hair, quicksilver eyes and a quicksilver smile, smoking a cigarette with one hand and twirling the straw around his milkshake with the other? Remus sighed and stirred his own milkshake, trying not to stare past Peter’s already well-thumbed copy of this week’s Beano. His copy of Mansfield Park on the bar seemed far less interesting now, and despite his dislike of greasers, the ones currently sprawled in that booth seemed to hold his attention. Especially that one… the boy all fine lines and sharp angles, somehow elegant fingers on the rim of his glass despite being tipped in black paint, scraped across the knuckles and smudged in motor oil. The leather jacket on the seat next to him, the sunglasses pushed up onto his head, tight black t-shirt, cuffed jeans, black creepers - everything about him was so alien and intriguing. He looked older than Remus by a few years, something about the way he held himself perhaps, the idle way he sat back with one ankle crossed over the other knee. He looked dangerous and exciting.
Remus wondered at the back of his mind if they would be in the Hollow for long enough for Remus to find out his name. It would be something cool, probably. Would he have a nickname? That was a greaser thing to do, wasn’t it? Would it be something only his friends called him, could Remus call him that? Or maybe a pet name. Maybe the boy would call him a pet name… he imagined for a moment the boy stepping up to him, drawling Hello, dolly just like he did to Lily.
“Remus?”
Remus jerked back to reality and found both Lily and Peter staring at him curiously. He forced a smile and fingered the edge of the plaster across his nose as a reflex. Hopefully it could come off soon. He’d scratched a little too viciously at the sore, flaky skin across his cheeks, and that particular spot hadn’t stopped bleeding. It said something to the regularity of those incidents that no one had commented on it. “Sorry, daydreaming.”
Peter grinned and fished an ice cube out of his lemonade glass to crunch on. Lily glanced around the coffee bar to make sure no one needed anything before leaning in on one elbow, her ponytail swinging to the side. “Oh yeah? Anything interesting?”
Remus knew he was more like Lily than Peter when it came to looking through magazines or going through to Hogsmeade for the drive-in. He liked Elvis in the way Lily did, but he also liked Marilyn Monroe in the way Peter did, and Marlon Brando too. Not that he’d said anything about the fact he paid more attention to Marlon Brando than Jean Simmons in Guys and Dolls, because he also preferred Marilyn over Cary Grant in Monkey Business. It made his head hurt when he thought about it for too long, so it was easier just not to think about it at all.
Besides, he’d kissed Alice Fortescue at the winter dance in high school, before she’d started going steady with Frank Longbottom, and at the May Day party he’d danced with Mary MacDonald for a little while, so he was utterly normal, wasn’t he? Besides the fact that Marlon Brando did look incredibly attractive in Guys and Dolls, and he did kiss Arthur Weasley before he moved to Hogsmeade, and the greaser sat in that booth with a quicksilver smile made his heart beat faster and faster and faster.
“No, no, just, a little tired is all.”
Peter set the Beano down and peered at him, blue eyes bright. “You need to head home? You’ll get sick again, else, won’t you?”
Remus shook his head. He had actually been feeling quite well recently, and although he was tired and his knees were aching far beyond his 17 years, it didn’t seem all-encompassing. “Nah, I’ll be swell. I’ll just take it easy.”
Peter smiled and nodded, he seemed pretty easily placated. Although Remus got sick, it wasn’t too often, and he seemed to be able to tell when it was setting in. Sometimes, however, he ignored those signs, and it was up to his friends to enforce him to stop and sit down for a moment. Thankfully they hadn’t needed to do that for a while. On the whole, Remus’ friends and family were quite good with the mystery illness the family doctor couldn’t quite diagnose. All they knew was that he got very tired sometimes as if he had the flu (the doctor had called them flare-ups, apparently) but anything beyond that was just guesswork. Remus had gotten used to it.
A commotion on the other side of the coffee bar drew Remus’ attention back up from his book. The boy with the black hair was coming this way, along with the other boy too, the taller one with the thick-rimmed glasses. Remus’ heart leapt in his throat for a moment before he realised they were obviously coming to speak to Lily to settle their bill. Remus tried to lose himself back in Mansfield Park, but the quicksilver eyes and the quicksilver smile drew him in.
“Just the bill?” Lily intoned, resolutely ignoring the taller boy with the hair who seemed to be staring at her.
The quicksilver boy leant one elbow on the counter and glanced around. He caught Remus staring, and Remus felt his cheeks immediately flush even brighter red, but he couldn’t bring himself to look away, he just wanted to look at those eyes and the cheekbones and the way a slow, self-assured smirk bloomed over his mouth. The boy had caught him staring, but he didn’t seem angry or put off. He was just smiling right back at Remus, those eyes flickering all over his face, down his jumper, the book in his hands that he suddenly felt wildly self-conscious about. Remus shivered and bit his lip, eyes flickering back to his book after a long moment.
“So what is there to do around here for fun, dolly?” The boy asked Lily in an easy, conversational tone. Remus wondered if he had carried on looking at him once he had turned back to his book.
Lily sighed. “Don’t call me that.”
“What should I call you then, dolly?” He shot back, still in an easy tone. Remus heard the tones of the till ringing up.
“My name is Lily, but I’d prefer it if you didn’t call me anything.”
The two greasers laughed, the taller one grinning. “I’m James,” a deeper voice, must be from the taller one, Remus still didn’t look up, “and this is Sirius.”
Remus’ heart stuttered at the name, that must be the quicksilver boy, mustn’t it?
He still didn’t look up, picturing the tight fake-smile on Lily’s lips over the sound of the till opening and closing. His book had lost all of its previous allure, but he was determined not to put it down.
“Wonderful. Have a nice day, thanks for coming to Evans’s.” Lily’s voice, then Remus saw her busying herself at the sink. In his periphery, Remus saw the movement of black leather, the two boys, then the others from their booth, strolling towards the door.
“Say,” the voice came closer than Remus expected, and he looked up to see the boy leaning casually against the bar, his friends waiting a few feet away. He was glancing around the room and Remus found himself holding his breath to see those eyes close up. Remus bit his lip and waited for him to continue, wondering if he would even be able to speak if he were asked a question. “There any places to stay around here? We’re here for a while.” Then his eyes finally landed on Remus and they were even brighter close up, smiling and warm and piercing all at once.
“Um.” Remus willed himself not to stutter. “McGonagall has a B&B, j-just… just down the road.” Next to him, Peter set down his magazine and watched the greasers too. He saw Lily pause at the sinks and try to watch them out of the corner of her eye, but Remus knew, he could see her listening.
The quicksilver boy - Sirius, that was his name - smiled and Remus thought for a second he might go blind with the brightness of it. It made the ache in his joints fade away. “Thanks, uh-”
“Remus,” he supplied, before realising that it was probably a ridiculously stupid idea to give the greaser his name. He probably hadn’t even been asking for it and Remus had jumped the gun but his heart was beating a mile a minute.
But the boy just smiled wider. “Remus, I’m Sirius.” When Remus couldn’t quite make the words come, Sirius smiled and took a breath. “Well, it’s been unreal, Remus. See you around?”
Remus just managed to nod before Sirius turned and strolled out of Evans’s with his gang.
“I’m tellin’ ya’, Sirius. I’m in deep, I’m real gone, she’s a knock-out, she’s- she’s-” James Potter glanced back towards the coffee bar as he swung a leg over Sirius’ bike. They were headed down to the B&B Sirius had found out about. He was glad Sirius had asked, anyway, or else James was perfectly content to sleep outside Lily’s pad until she gifted him a smile. “I’m on Cloud 9, I swear.”
“Put a lid on it, James.” Sirius started the bike with a kick and they pulled off down the small road. “She looked at you like you were stuck to the bottom of her shoe - it ain’t gonna happen.” He parked up a short drive down the road and James wondered why they didn’t just walk and leave the bikes further up. “I’m sure there are some other fast girls around here somewhere if you’re dyin’ to get your end away.” Sirius grinned and elbowed him in the ribs.
James rolled his eyes and climbed off the bike. “Nah, I’m not into fast girls, I want that queen.” He grinned and ducked into the front door of the bed and breakfast to find a stern looking woman with dark hair in a stern looking bun sat at a desk.
She peered at James and Sirius from behind her wire-framed glasses as Marlene, Dorcas, Gideon, Fabian, Caradoc and Bones filed in behind them. “Good afternoon, gentlemen, ladies.”
James heard Marlene chuckle about being called a lady - that rarely happened - and smiled his best smile at the woman. “Afternoon, ma’am. We’re looking for a place to stay for a while, were told you could help us out.”
After a moment, the woman peered around the eight of them again before looking down to a ledger beneath her elbow. “I suppose so. But I want no funny business, no fighting, nothing untoward under my roof, do you hear me?”
James smiled and ran a hand over his hair. “Yes ma’am, you have my word.”
She peered at them for another long moment. James felt like he was back in the Army, being stared down by his Sergeant, back ram-rod straight, lips pressed tight together, Sirius at his shoulder, both of them wondering if they would see the outside world again. But they did, after conscription they both checked out of Her Majesty’s service, bought a motorbike each, founded the Marauders, found their blood brothers and sisters and never looked back. James held the woman’s gaze. He wasn’t scared by the way she peered at him over the frame of her glasses - he had seen the yawning black maw of death, both on the battlefield and staring down the barrel of a rivals gun.
“Very well,” the woman said, and busied herself with finding keys for them.
Once their business had been settled, James sat heavily on the end of the bed in their room. It wasn’t much to look at, nothing compared to some of the places they had stayed in London, or even Hogsmeade, but it was better than sleeping under the stars like they had done several times before.
Sirius looked around the room, lit a cigarette and toed off his boots. James watched him curiously - he seemed oddly animated, wound up for some reason. “This place is Nowheresville, huh? Maybe we’d have been better sticking on for a bit longer, make it to Hogsmeade to get your bike fixed.”
James lit his own cigarette and laid back on the bed, thinking about the redhead from the coffee bar. Lily, she’d said, hadn’t she? She was a real piece of work, fiery and smart, and James was definitely head over heels for her already.
“Nah,” James said as he blew out a plume of smoke and turned to look at Sirius sprawled across his own bed. “This place is alright, something’ll end up razzin’ your berries sooner or later, won’t it? No one caught your attention back there, no fast girls, fast guys?”
Sirius rolled over and kicked James in the shin. James sniggered and pushed his foot back. “There ain’t no fast guys here, James. Nowsheresville don’t know the meaning of ‘queer’, does it?”
“I dunno,” James shot back, rolling onto his side to reach for the ashtray beside the bed. “Maybe things are different out in the sticks, maybe everyone’s a poofter.”
“Shut it, square.” Sirius threw his cigarette case at James’ head, but he deflected it with a deft hand that said something to the frequency of projectiles thrown between them. Sirius knew he was only teasing - he was more than comfortable with his best friends proclivities, so long as he didn’t have to walk in on Sirius and some fast guy getting to know each other the same way Sirius didn’t want to walk in on James and a dame having a good time.
“Alright, alright,” James said brightly, clapping his hands together. “I’m gettin’ a bath. We can clean up and go see how Nowheresville spends its nighttime, huh?”
Sirius chuckled and followed him into the bathroom with a clap on the shoulder.
The bath water was surprisingly warm as James scrubbed up, Sirius shaving at the small mirror next to him. Everything was always easy between them. It came from sharing close quarters, at school, through the Army, on the bikes. James styled his hair in the mirror, cigarette at the corner of his mouth, towel around his hips, as Sirius scrubbed up in the bath after him, whistling some tune from the jukebox in the coffee bar.
A while later, with the sun lower in the sky, both of them emerged back onto the quiet streets of Godric’s Hollow, washed up, ready to roar with Marlene, Dorcas, Gid, Fab, Caradoc and Bones beside them.
Lily puffed out a breath and untied her apron from her waist. Through the window, she could already see her friends gathering on the village green, blankets laid out between them. It had become tradition after a while, that every summer, when the weather was beautiful and Evans’s was too overrun with the adults to be anything other than Boring Central, they would congregate there. The idea only seemed even more of a good one when Peter’s father got a radio for his workshop, which Peter faithfully borrowed for their nightly gatherings.
Of course, Chief Lupin had been pretty upset when he found out they were there a lot. It probably had something to do with the two six-packs of beer that Ted got from his older brother, but Remus had pointed out that in fact, they were all responsible enough, and no one could get drunk on the beer. Besides, he’d said in that wonderfully level voice that came across when he’d had far too much of his father tarring everyone with the same brush, it’s better that they were here on the village green and not in someone’s front room causing a riot for parents, or trying to hide away their behaviour. Because teenagers - Chief Lupin had scoffed at the word - were allowed to be teenagers.
Remus had tilted his chin up and watched his father walk away again. The rest of the group had touched his upper arm with muttered words of thanks, but Remus just kept staring at his father’s retreating back. He had such a quiet strength to him that Lily had almost dismissed when he first arrived at the Hollow. He was incredibly shy at first, but now Remus was fiercely protective of his friends, and fiercely against anything that his father deemed acceptable.
So now, the teens were allowed to sit on the village green, spread out their blankets and turn on their radio to actually be teenagers. Lily had convinced her mother with the line of would you rather us be on the green, or out in Hogsmeade trying to get served in a pub? That had stopped her arguing, and by the way Alice had appeared in the coffee bar the next day, her mother had passed that tidbit onto the other parents involved too. Happily, they congregated on the green to drink weak beer, dance to Jerry Lee Lewis and chat about life.
Shaken from her memories, Lily stepped out from behind the bar and into the kitchen where her father was in the middle of cooking for the dinner rush of the adults. “Do you need anything else before I’m done, Pa?”
“No,” George intoned without looking up from his myriad of pans. “I’ll be fine, your mother is coming along in a moment.”
“Alright, if you’re sure.” Lily folded up her apron and set it on the counter in the corner. “Well, Tunie and I will be on the green, then.”
George tutted disapprovingly but smiled in Lily’s direction anyway. “You be careful with those greasers about, love.”
“Yes, Pa. We’ll be on our best behaviour.” Lily crossed the kitchen and lightly hugged her father, stretching onto her toes to kiss his cheek. “I’ll see you back at home.”
“Not too late!”
“No, Pa!” Lily grinned as she stepped out of the kitchen, and weaved through the tables, full with adults and parents now the teens had vacated their spaces. She smiled nicely at a few parents, kissed a few cheeks and eventually stepped out into the mild summer air.
Alice lifted an arm and waved her over to their group with a smile so bright Lily could see it across the grass.
“Hello everyone.” Lily puffed out another exhale of breath and sat cross-legged between her sister and Mary as the replies chimed around the group with a well-known melody between them all. Almost everyone was there. Peter was fiddling with the radio, tongue between his teeth, to find the Hogsmeade FM channel that had fast become their group favourite. Ted was setting a few six-packs into a bucket of ice water someone must have brought from their garden.
“You see those greasers leavin’ the coffee bar earlier?” Alice asked, leaning forward with her chin on her hand.
“They looked like trouble to me,” Frank chimed in, shaking his head a little as he looked across the village green.
“Yeah, I agree. They were givin’ Tunie and I a hard time, weren’t they?” Lily glanced over to her sister, who nodded emphatically. “We gotta deal with the Death Eaters and these ones now?”
Peter looked up from the radio, now settled on the channel, tapping his foot as Connie Francis started through the speaker. “Let’s just hope they move on before they can cause trouble.”
Ted shrugged. “I dunno, We’ve managed the Death Eaters this whole time haven’t we?” He cracked open a can and settled next to Peter. “And they would’ve wrecked the place by now… these guys don’t seem as bad?”
Lily shrugged. She hated all greasers. Years of bad experiences from the Eaters coming into the coffee bar made it difficult to see past the leather jackets and shiny hair and awful presumptuous smirks. Still, she wouldn’t argue with her friend, just be there to help Ted pick up the pieces, like they all did, once the greasers rioted through town and left again in a day or so.
“Did that one say anything to you, Rem?” Mary asked after a moment of silence, leaning forward to speak to Remus, who had been idly watching the clouds, not quite part of the conversation.
Remus lifted one shoulder. “He just asked where they could stay, that’s all… They seemed fine enough.” He held Mary’s gaze until she hummed an agreement and turned to chatter away with Alice, then dropped his head back to watch the clouds again. Was he blushing because of his illness, or was it for something else entirely?
Sirius swung his leg over his bike to head back through Godric’s Hollow and see what came alive when everything else was starting to sleep. He’d seen a girl in pedal pushers with her arm linked through the arm of a boy in a shirt buttoned to the collar on their way to the B&B earlier. They looked like they were going somewhere, and Sirius wanted to find out where the hep cats spent their evenings at Godric’s Hollow.
James had convinced Marlene to let him ride her bike, so Sirius had Dorcas with her arms around his waist, chuckling at the novelty of a man between her legs. Sirius grinned back and wiggled his bum back against her just to make her even more uncomfortable, earning a slap on the shoulder. Sirius slowed down as they pulled past the coffee bar from earlier, quirking an eyebrow to see a group of teenagers gathered on the village green under the pallid light of a lone streetlamp.
He turned his head to mutter into Dorcas’ temple. “Shall we check this out? Seems like the only happenin’ thing in this place.”
“Yeah, alright.” Dorcas smiled and turned on the pillion to gesture to James and Marlene - who was looking glum as hell, with her chin perched on James’ shoulder - and the rest of the gang followed. Sirius pulled up onto the grass of the green and dropped down the kickstand, grinning in delight when the group of teens looked up from their place sat on the grass, a few blankets spread beneath them. Damn, these kids looked just like he and James did before they got conscripted - so young and carefree.
Once he killed the engine Sirius heard the hum of a transistor radio and quickly looked around to find it sat next to one of the boys. Sirius let Dorcas slide off the bike behind him - not offering his arm because she didn’t bloody need it - before climbing off himself. He saw a few vaguely familiar faces; the redhead Lily, the blonde boy reading the Beano, and Remus, Remus with his curly brown hair and deep brown eyes. Sirius smiled wider and straightened his jacket.
The whole group seemed to bristle as the Marauders strolled up, James holding a bottle of liquor he’d taken from his knapsack earlier.
“Mind if we join you?” James drawled, an easy smile on his face, shaking the bottle in his hand as a sweetener to the deal.
No one seemed to dare to say anything. But Sirius shifted his gaze to Remus, leant back on one hand as if he had been staring up at the darkening sky. Remus smiled softly, just for a second before he looked away again.
James shrugged off the awkwardness and settled down to sit in the circle the teens had created. He popped the cork from the top of the liquor as Sirius sat next to him and smiled at Remus, who seemed to be entirely avoiding his gaze and instead glanced down into the can of beer he was nursing.
Lily, the redhead from the coffee bar, leant forward as Sirius took a pull on the liquor bottle. “We don’t want any trouble from the likes of you.”
Marlene, who had moved around to sit next to the Beano boy, looking terrified by the presence of a woman, snorted with laughter. She leant forward to snag a can of beer from the bucket of cold water in the middle of their circle. “We’re not here to cause trouble, sugar. Relax, we’re just kickin’ back.”
Dorcas grinned and prised the can from her lovers fingers to take a drink, putting a hand on her thigh. The ripple of tension through the group didn’t pass by Sirius, and any hope of some fast boys in Godric’s Hollow sank away.
“Sure,” a boy said, looking as authoritative as he sounded, and Sirius had to smile. Not everyone here was a wet blanket, it seemed. “I’m Ted.” He leant over the group to offer a hand to James, who gave off that natural leadership vibe.
James grinned and shook his hand. “James.”
Sirius took the lead after that, raising a hand to wave at Ted and introduce himself. Then the rest of the Marauders gave their own names through easy laughter and drinks. Ted cleared his throat and looked pointedly around the group before someone else spoke up.
“I’m Frank, this is Alice,” said the boy in the collared shirt, indicating to the girl in pedal pushers Sirius had seen walking earlier.
“Mary,” said a pretty blonde girl in a poodle skirt and polka dot blouse, then the Beano boy, who introduced himself as Peter. Sirius grinned as Remus introduced himself and waved shyly to the rest of the group, Sirius swelling with pride that he already knew the boy’s name.
Sirius lit a cigarette as the blonde next to Lily spoke up. “I’m Petunia.” The boy on the other side of her with a sharp moustache seemed wholly displeased with the situation, but introduced himself as Vernon anyway.
Lily rolled her eyes and opened a can of beer. James visibly perked up next to Sirius - the girl he was in deep for drank beer too? - and he had to hide a chuckle in the elbow of his jacket. “You already know who I am,” Lily said with a pointed look towards James, who simply grinned back.
“That I do, baby,” James drawled, running a hand through his hair.
Lily sighed and turned back to Petunia to continue a conversation, effectively turning her back on James, who Sirius wasn’t sure had ever been turned down by a dame before. James looked like a lovesick puppy for a moment before he took another swig of the liquor bottle. Sirius laughed and threw an arm around his shoulders.
Soon enough, James’ liquor bottle was empty, passed around the two groups now melded into one, Peter and Gideon in a discussion about Dennis the Menace of Beano fame, Marlene teaching Mary and Alice the best way to tie a scarf around their hair without it coming loose from the wind. Sirius watched, leaning back on his hand, and mused on the trappings of society. Everyone looked and acted different, but maybe they weren’t all so different, they all seemed roughly the same age, just from different places.
“Hello,” a voice from next to Sirius startled him, and he tilted his head to see Remus settling next to him. Sirius smiled slowly, he was nicely buzzing and seeing some dreamy fella sitting next to him with a shy smile and that curl of hair just so was the cherry on top of his cake of a good evening.
“Hello Remus,” Sirius drawled back, lighting a cigarette for something to do with his hands. He paused and offered his cigarette case out to the other boy.
“I don’t smoke… I don’t think,” Remus said as he watched Sirius strike a match and light the cigarette. “You remembered me.”
Sirius smiled wider and took a drag on his cigarette, raising his head up to blow the smoke away from the other boy, aware he was being watched and so what if he put on a little show blowing a smoke ring. “Of course I did, doll.”
“Doll?” Remus’ cheeks were pink in the streetlight, was he flushed from the beer or Sirius’ compliment?
“Uh-huh.” Sirius drew on his cigarette and delighted at Remus watching his mouth. “Do you like doll, or would something else be better?”
Remus’ eyebrows sprang up towards his hairline and a smile threatened the corners of his mouth. Sirius didn’t have eyes for anyone else, even as he heard Dorcas shriek with laughter, and Caradoc stand up to mimic Chuck Berry on the guitar, the radio turned up now everyone was loose with liquor and dancing. Everything else had the volume turned down. Remus stared at a point just over Sirius’ shoulder, as if he didn’t quite want to meet his eye. “N-no, doll is fine… it’s fine.”
Sirius grinned wider and finally glanced around the group. James was trying his hardest to hit on Lily, who was definitely ignoring him, but everyone else looked in good spirits. Sirius took another pull on his cigarette before holding the butt end out to Remus. “You don’t think you smoke?”
Remus’ well-deep eyes flickered between the proffered cigarette and Sirius’ smile. He looked adorable, all honeyed and blurry in the soft light, the sun now setting around them. Sirius was sweet on him already, wanted to bundle him up in one of their picnic blankets and make him feel good. “I don’t think so, no.” Remus turned a little, watching the smoke curl. “But you make it look so sweet.”
Sirius laughed, taking the cigarette back and taking a draw. “I do?”
“Uh-huh,” Remus shot back, scarlet red and swigging his beer.
“Well, I’m glad, doll.”
Remus smiled to hide the hammering of his heart. Did he really just say that? He’d never acted on his Marlon-over-Marilyn thoughts before, if you didn’t count his drunken kiss with Arthur Weasley, and really no one remembered that but him, occasionally, in the middle of the night, in cold sweats thinking about his mistakes. But Sirius didn’t seem to care, just continued smoking his cigarette, pink lips and quicksilver eyes this time, shining with liquor and streetlights and sunset.
Remus felt fuzzy. He’d had too much beer, a few too many pulls of that liquor bottle. But it was a good kind of fuzzy, sat opposite Sirius, the sunset throwing a whole host of colours across the shine of his black hair, longer than the other boys wore it, brushing the shoulders of his leather jacket, sunglasses pushed up on the top of his head as the sky grew darker.
He glanced away, because those quicksilver eyes felt far too piercing, and saw Alice and Frank were rockin’ and rollin’ to the radio, Jerry Lee Lewis playing, the bow in Alice’s hair bopping to the music. Vernon and Petunia were dancing too, and he was sure Sirius’ friend - James, was it, with the hair? - was trying to get Lily to dance. It wasn’t going well.
Sirius seemed to see their conversation across the green, and indicated towards them with his cigarette. “James is hung up on your friend, you know.”
Remus laughed and drained the rest of his beer. “I can tell. She’s far from easy.”
“Oh, I’d expect so. No one around here seems easy.” Sirius stubbed his cigarette out in the dirt.
“You say that like it’s a bad thing.” Remus frowned a little. What was that supposed to mean? Was Sirius expecting the girls around the Hollow to be easy, was he expecting him to be easy? …Was he? He was pretty sure if Sirius kissed him, he wouldn’t push him away, would he?
“No, not a bad thing.” Sirius glanced across to Remus, a long look from the corner of his eye that made Remus grin ear to ear, so much that his face was hurting. His hands were tight gripping on his knees and he remembered the last person he kissed was Mary, sweet blonde Mary who kissed like she was scared of being devoured alive. But Sirius, oh, Sirius would kiss like he was the devourer, Remus thought, like he was striding into the town of Remus’ mouth and causing havoc at the coffee bar of his throat.
“Good.” Remus looked back to the group and let out a long breath. Were his hands shaking? “Good, I’m glad.”
Sirius smiled another one of his slow smiles, creeping across his lips and brightening the whole village green. Remus felt breathless, and he wondered if that meant he would be having a flare up soon. Was this the high before the fall of his adrenaline, the fevers, the aches, or was it Sirius? He took a deep breath and looked out over the group, listening as Sirius whistled along to the music.
The darker-skinned girl of their group, Dorcas, had coerced Peter into dancing, except she was leading, spinning him around, and Peter was getting more and more red-faced, grinning madly every time she spun him around, a laugh on her painted lips. Remus had never seen people look so adventurous before. Even the Death Eaters, when they came through, were in shades of grey, dark slicked hair - although one of them was very blonde, if he remembered - dark jackets, dark jeans, dark expressions.
But these guys were all the colours - Marlene with yellow hair and painted red lips, dark-chocolate Dorcas, the flaming red hair of the twins, James and a grin that seemed to saturate the world - as much as Lily would’ve hated that thought - and Sirius, quicksilver Sirius who made Remus’ heart beat out of his chest. Oh, he was a goner.
Lily leant over and tapped him on the shoulder. Remus started and tried to remember if he had been leaning in towards Sirius or not, if they had been closer than appropriate, if their shared smiles seemed secretive or if his cheeks were redder than usual. Lily didn’t seem to care, she looked a little frazzled in fact.
“Dance with me, Rem,” Lily instructed as she thrust out a hand to pull him up. She glanced over to Sirius, who was watching with a smile on his lips. “You tell your friend to lay off it, will you? I don’t want to dance with him.”
Sirius laughed and nodded, lighting another cigarette as Remus stood and held Lily’s hands to dance. He wasn’t much of a cat, but he could move, enough to dance with Alice at the winter dance before she was going steady with Frank, enough to get away with it, enough to jive a little with a girl at the Hogsmeade drive-in one night after too many beers. He probably didn’t dance well enough to dance with Sirius, he thought.
He tried not to be obvious as he watched Sirius stand from their previous spot and walk around to Marlene, cigarette at the corner of his mouth as he held a hand out to her. Remus wondered if Sirius would rather be dancing with him. Which one of them would lead, he wondered as he spun Lily out, her red hair spinning along with her skirts, and looked across to see Marlene dancing, all jeans and leather next to Sirius. Sirius was grinning, cigarette still dangling from the corner of his lips, spinning Marlene and jivin’ and rockin’ in all the right ways, like he and Marlene had danced together a million times before, like Remus and Lily, but then he and Lily were just friends. Were Sirius and Marlene just friends, too? What was the likelihood of the boy he was crushing on also being a Marlon-over-Marilyn kinda guy. Had he read it wrong? Maybe Sirius was a Marilyn-over-Marlon kind of guy, and he had just made a fool of himself.
The song gave way back to the radio presenter, but his honey-smooth voice didn’t sound as sweet now Remus had heard Sirius’ dulcet laugh so close to his ear. Lily popped onto her toes, braced her hand on his upper arm, and kissed his cheek as a thank you. Remus tried not to notice the disgruntled sound James made when she pulled away and went back to sit next to her handbag.
Remus stifled a yawn into his elbow. Sometimes he forgot he got sick, that he had less energy than the others might, and perhaps it might be time to call it a night. He retrieved his jacket from the corner of one of the picnic blankets and crossed over to Lily. “I’m headed home,” he advised, shrugging his jacket on against the impending chill of the night now the sun had truly set.
“Alright. You’ll get home okay?” Lily said, already mid-discussion with Mary. Remus wondered for a moment how girls could carry on a conversation about anything at all, but smiled back nonetheless.
“Yeah, I’ll get home fine. See you tomorrow.”
Remus turned and saw the rest of the group dancing still, Marlene was dancing with Dorcas now, both of them wiggling their hips and gyrating closer than Remus had seen two girls dance before. He supposed Marlene and Dorcas were both Marilyn-over-Marlon kinds of girls. The two redheaded twins were teaching Peter how to dance like Elvis now Jailhouse Rock was playing, and Peter was wiggling his legs and pointing his toes like Remus had never seen before. Surprisingly, he looked quite good doing it. Remus smiled to himself at the thought.
“I’ll walk you home.” Sirius’ voice came from beside him, and Remus glanced to see the boy lighting another cigarette. He idly wondered how much tobacco Sirius must get through, before he smiled softly.
“That’d be swell, thanks…” He didn’t miss Lily’s glare from next to them, but rolled his eyes and walked past. For some stupid reason, he wasn’t scared of walking back home with Sirius. He might look a little intimidating but Remus knew Lily’s prejudices came from the run-ins with the Death Eaters, and Remus knew the people they were sat with now were different.
“So long as you walk, Remus. You’re not getting on that bloody bike,” Lily said, sounding stern as anything, and Remus had to laugh.
“Yes, mum.”
Sirius chuckled from beside him. “You got my word, Red, I’ll get him home safe.”
Remus felt his cheeks warm, but Lily looked unimpressed. “Your word don’t mean a thing to me, Black.”
Lily was clearly referencing his hair in the same way Sirius referenced hers, but a flash of something passed through Sirius’ quicksilver eyes. He recovered it in a second, smiling and giving Lily a remarkably sharp salute before turning to Remus. “Shall we?”
Remus smiled and started back towards the path. The Police House wasn’t too far away, only a few minutes walk down the alley past the coffee bar and into the estate behind. Sirius strolled beside him, one hand shoved in the pocket of his jeans, the other with a cigarette dangling between the fingers. Remus walked quite slowly, hands in the pockets of his bomber jacket, and wondered if Sirius felt like he was walking home from a date too. Remus kept sneaking sidelong glances at Sirius’ profile, all sharp angles, the line of his nose, the sleek black of his eyebrows, the smile curling the corners of his lips.
Remus felt the tang of conversation in the back of his throat. “Your friends… Marlene and Dorcas,” he murmured, risking another glance sideways to Sirius, all the moonlight and darkening sky now the streetlights had been left behind. “They’re…” The heat flared in his cheeks. “I don’t know the right word.”
Sirius chuckled, took a long drag on his cigarette and crushed it beneath his boot without breaking his stride. “Queer? Bent? Rug-munchers?”
Remus choked on thin air at the barrage of terms. “Yeah… yeah, that.” He felt a little stupid now, was that a better word? Was that a Marilyn-over-Marlon kind of gal? Was that what he could be called too, only with boys and not girls? He swallowed and scrubbed a hand through his hair. “I’ve never heard it called… heard any of that before.”
Sirius smiled his slow, syrupy smile again. “Not a lot of queers in Godric’s Hollow, huh?”
Remus slowed to a stop at the hedge down the street from his house. He definitely didn’t want his parents seeing some greaser boy walk him home. His cheeks still felt flaming hot, his fingers shaking and all he could think about was Sirius’ slow smile reflecting in the moonlight. Sirius stopped as he did and turned expectantly, waiting for his answer. Remus cleared his throat. “No, not a lot of… queers, no.”
Sirius smiled another quicksilver smile, faster that time, perhaps it reached his eyes. He shifted his weight from one foot to the other, then reached out and touched Remus on the upper arm. Remus went still, unsure of what to do, as Sirius’ fingers trailed down his arm to take his hand. Sirius squeezed his fingers for a moment before bringing them up and pressing a kiss to the back of his hand. His lips were warm, slightly chapped but still soft. Remus hoped the imprint of Sirius’ tobacco would stay on his skin.
Remus couldn’t hold back the smile that bloomed across his face. He imagined this was the same way Petunia felt when Vernon asked her to dance at the May Day dance, or how Alice felt when Frank asked her to go steady. Sirius had only kissed his hand, that didn’t seem on par did it? But still, Remus felt giddy with it.
Sirius’ smile widened. “G’night, doll.”
Remus nodded. “Goodnight, Sirius. Thank you for walking me home.”
Remus ducked away after that, Sirius’ fingers squeezing his one last time before he let go, stepped through the garden gate and hurried down the path. The door was on the latch but he pushed it closed when he stepped through and found his mother already in the front room. He wondered if the happiness showed on his face and pressed a cool hand to his cheek to try and tamp down on the redness.
“Have a nice time out, dear?” Hope asked without looking up from the crocheting she had in her lap. The radio was on in the corner, the quiet hum of the music a stark contrast to the volume of Peter’s dad’s radio on the village green, Jerry Lee Lewis in their veins.
Remus just nodded and leant against the door, wondering if Sirius was still outside. “Yeah, had a good night, Ma. Da not here?”
Hope shook her head. “No, he was called through to Little Whinging to help out there.”
Remus nodded, glad his father wasn’t here, to quiz him on what they had gotten up to that evening. Lyall didn’t seem to understand that ‘kids these days’ were allowed to go out and do things by themselves, to sit with their friends and talk and socialise - that Remus was entirely separate from his father. “I’m going to bed, if that’s alright? Feeling a little… tired.”
Hope set her crocheting down and peered at him over the top of her reading glasses. “You getting sick again?”
“No, Ma, I’ll be swell. See you tomorrow.”
Remus leant over the back of the sofa to kiss his mothers cheek before climbing the stairs and getting into bed. He fell asleep a few moments after taking his medication, sleeping deeply until the morning, dreaming of quicksilver.