Chapter Text
Remus Lupin wakes at 5:47am to the sound of police dogs in the garden. Jonathan, his cat, gives a half-hearted hiss from the end of the bed, and a torch shines through the flimsy net curtains of the bedroom window. Five minutes later, speaking despondently into their walkie talkies, the huddle of policemen crunch back out again. A helicopter sounds overhead. This is not, as you might expect it to be, an uncommon occurrence, and Remus soon goes back to sleep.
Sunlight bothers him again at seven, and with the vigor of Nosferatu he hauls himself up in bed and wishes he could have died in his sleep. Rest assured, this is a sentiment he only ever really possesses between seven o'clock and seven thirty, but it's been a fairly constant one for the past six years nonetheless.
He pats Jonathan awake to get him to shift off his numb feet, then climbs out of bed and pads into the bathroom, yawning and trying to reach an itch on his lower back. He looks into the mirror first, which is a mistake, then switches the shower on, waits four seconds for water to begin chugging noisily out the top like a smoker's cough, and pulls off his nightly uniform of too-big pyjama bottoms and faded Pink Floyd t-shirt. He wears them largely because it seems like appropriate bachelor attire and because, at twenty-seven, he can no longer seriously sport such a shirt in public.
Then again, it's so stuffy and sweltering in his flat at night he usually ends up shucking all his clothes off by one in the morning and sleeping naked instead. It isn’t as though there's anybody about to shock. No one but Jonathan, and Remus is becoming concerned he's getting so fat his eyelids are going to soon be permanently closed anyway.
Must take him to the vet is his last thought before he closes the shower door and steps beneath the water. His curse reverberates about the tiled walls when it scalds him, and again when someone in the flat above puts a tap on and the water lashes down like ice.
"Another raid," says Mrs Pitcher, the landlady, rifling through the post. Not just her own either. She has at least three tenants' unopened envelopes clutched between four skeletal fingers and one gremlin thumb. She is an old woman - at least one hundred and eighty seven - and always speaks from the side of her mouth like a Walt Disney crook.
"Yes, it woke me up," says Remus.
"Dare say it woke the whole bloody street up. And I bet they didn't catch him."
"Never do, do they?"
"Theft, I expect," she sniffs. "Mr Townsend mentioned to me only last week how his terracotta flowerpots have been going missing - "
"Actually, Mrs Pitcher, d'you mind if I just collect my post? I'm in a bit of a hurry is all. Tuesday morning, you know the drill!"
She huffs with ancient breath and at a glacial pace shifts a generous three inches to let him past. Remus smiles and sticks an arm around her to paw in his pigeon box, takes the bills, BookPeople catalogue and Pizza King leaflet he finds there and stuffs them into his bag.
"Goodbye, Mrs Pitcher. Have a lovely day!"
She waves a hand, not answering.
Remus' journey, made twice daily, takes the form of one brisk eleven and a half minute walk, three tube station stops, a seven minute bus journey through several grimy south London streets, and another five minute walk or three minute jog depending on how late he happens to be.
Today he’s in enough time for it to be the walk, which means it could actually turn out to be quite a good day. Odd really, given that it's a Tuesday and Tuesdays are, Remus has always maintained, atrocious. Staff progress meeting, late lunch hour and, given that it's still the start of the week, one can always be sure there'll be a gargantuan stack of work matching the height of his divider waiting for him on the desk.
He clocks in just on time right alongside Peter, who's balancing his slip with a cream cheese bagel. Most of it's clinging to his flashing snowman tie. He's been wearing it for two weeks now, and the red flashes are starting to jar and blink. If you press the carrot nose it sings a demonic version of Frosty the Snowman.
"'Lo, Remus," says Peter, spraying crumbs.
"Morning, Pete."
"Cutting it fine again."
"I know, I know."
"Late night?"
"Something like that."
"Ah, I feel you, mate."
Do you, Peter? Remus wonders, as a dollop of Philadelphia lands on the carpet. Do you 'feel' me?
Peter Pettigrew is the youngest in the office, and possibly the most in denial. He tries valiantly hard to enjoy his job, believes it has, in its gruelling monotony, a certain charm. Often he’ll lean back in his chair and sigh something like, “Ah, the daily grind,” without being prompted to speak. He’s utterly intrigued by everyone else’s business too, and isn’t happy until he's had his daily fix of gossip, which rarely takes the form of anything more exciting than somebody smoking half a joint in the third floor toilets.
Remus can rarely indulge him. This only seems to make Peter plague him more. It doesn't help that their flimsy cubicles stand side by side, so that when Remus goes to sit down at his, Peter follows.
His cubicle is three walls of metal-framed green felt. Someone has draped tattered red tinsel over the top in some vain attempt at kick-starting Remus' festive spirit. He has a plywood desk, a computer installed with Windows 98 on which you can occasionally get limited internet access and even Solitaire, a phone he has trouble transferring calls on, and his very own swivel chair, perfect for when he wants to quickly turn round and stare at the blank wall two feet behind him.
His closest amenities are the ladies' toilets and a vending machine which sells nothing but Minute Maid orange juice. On the felt walls he has a picture of Jonathan as a kitten, a staff timetable and an early Christmas card from his ex-boyfriend Mark he hasn't quite the heart to throw away.
"Are you going to the staff meeting later?" Peter asks.
"Of course I'm going. Why would I not be going?"
Peter shrugs, shooting a rubber band stress ball from hand to hand. His own cubicle is adorned mainly with newspaper clippings and comics that make him snort into his Rustlers southern fried sub of a lunchtime and simple recipes for the lazier bachelor, the pinnacles being "Guinness shrimp" and "three minute chocolate cake" (essentially microwaved hot chocolate powder, eggs, and, from what Peter has told him, a lot of good luck).
"I dunno. Just making conversation. You're really boring on Tuesdays, do you know that?"
"Sorry, Pete."
Remus fires up his computer and loosens the knot a little on his tie. He clicks the end of a red pen and lies it flat on a large refill pad salvaged from his single drawer, stretches his arms until they click, and begins his day's work.
And what, you are surely demanding, is this tantalizing work? Well. Remus Lupin helps to supply pencils.
It isn’t so bad, supplying pencils. They do, after all, need to be supplied. And their company supplies to everywhere: schools, hospitals, libraries, other offices. You name it, they supply there. The pencils are pretty exciting, too. They come in all colours and sizes, a whole plethora of pencils. There are even big glossy catalogues filled with all the different types, stowed away in filing cabinets in the store room. Pollock & Co., they're called, though Remus has never met Mr Pollock in his life. Or Mr Co.
There are perks. As many free pencils as he wants, for example. It’s reasonable pay, and the work isn't particularly challenging (although he often debates whether this last perk is indeed a perk at all). The office sits in a fairly safe area of London, in a fairly modern block of buildings, with a fairly lenient boss and a fairly friendly group of co-workers.
It's a living.
"Pencils are the original all-rounder," Frank, staff team leader, tells them that afternoon. They're all stuffed into the meeting room, dark and sweaty with the blinds shuttered against the beastly December weather. "Everyone uses them. Everyone needs them. Come rain or shine, recession or no, people will. Need. Pencils. I want all of you to remember that."
Frank is passionate about two things in life: his wife and pencils. He's a pleasant enough man (more pleasant still whenever, if ever, he manages to loosen up at the occasional office do) but it's difficult to have a conversation with him that doesn't start with either "my wife Alice" or "the thing about pencils is" or "Alice said that pencils are".
Nobody ever really listens to him, which is a shame because he tries so terribly hard. Even as he’s speaking now, one group are huddled on the table tops, legs swinging, chattering quite openly to one another like naughty children at school.
Hippy Dorcas with her droopy cardigans and weird jewellery, Marlene with legs up to her chin and extensions down to her backside, Caradoc with his big nose and oil-dripping voice, James with his boyish grin and silly, skinny ties, and his friend (because they’re known for being friends) Sirius, who is never anything but very composed and very cool and very capable of excessive laughter.
Truth be told, Remus has always harboured a little bit of a crush on Sirius Black, ever since he arrived at Pollock six months ago with his shirt sleeves rolled to his elbows and his expensive tie loose around his neck. He is, by all accounts, the office sweetheart. The younger women fancy him, the older women mother him, the men all want to accompany him to the pub of a Friday lunchtime, and he leans too far back in his chair and never falls.
But it's purely aesthetic, of course. He's stupidly handsome, and that's about as far as it goes. Remus has barely ever spoken a word to him.
Life has been quite kind to Sirius Black. As in any lifetime there have been many downs, but far more ups, and now, at twenty-five, he is in good health, with a good flat in south London not ten minutes from a fairly good job. Fair enough, it isn’t the most riveting of work, but he needs it. Hopefully he won't be here forever, and hopefully he'll one day leave on his own terms.
In the meantime, he's surrounded by good, friendly people, has found a particularly cherished friend in James Potter, the bloke in his neighbouring cubicle, and he doesn't really have to do much work in return for more than adequate pay.
Like many people, he isn’t living life in the way he initially intended, and he hasn’t sold a single piece of art for two years now. But he’s perfectly alright. Content, and comfortable.
He's also really incredibly bored.
He doesn't hate Pollock & Co. There isn't really anything to hate, besides the repetition. Still, he’s beginning to hate himself for even entertaining the idea of succumbing to the nine-to-five, to being "comfortable", let alone actually doing it. Which sounds terribly bohemian and childish, Sirius is aware, but unfortunately it's how he feels. He hasn’t had so much as a date, a kiss, in almost a year now, let alone a decent relationship. Some days he doesn't even bother to change out of his work clothes when he gets home. He finds himself doing terrifying things like buying day-planner calendars and making shopping lists and eating ready meals and talking to his goldfish and owning goldfish in the first place.
Three years in Art College just to end up in a modest flat on a quiet court, chatting merrily away to something with a three-second memory span while he irons his trousers. His father always insisted studying art was a waste. Sirius is worried he's beginning to prove him right.
He started looking for ways to try and make his life more exciting almost as soon as he began working at Pollock. He spends quite a bit of time with James out of hours, and he goes out with his workmates as much as humanly possible, and he always insists on new and interesting places to eat at lunch time. He tries to paint and go to galleries at the weekends when he isn't too busy (or tired) and he does his utmost to meet handsome, exciting men as contenders for his next boyfriend, something he feels he's in particularly dire need of.
All of the men in the office are straight, or taken, or honestly just a little bit ugly, and there's no one he much fancies. Except Remus, the guy in Sales who never speaks.
Well, he does. He once said "thank you" when Sirius held the door open for him, and "you're welcome" when he held the door open for Sirius. And he came up to Sirius on a morning three months ago to say, "Sirius, Kingsley would like you to fax him the purity stipulations if you're not too busy". Then he'd walked away, and Sirius had faxed Kingsley the purity stipulations, and peered at Remus very subtly from behind the wall of his cubicle.
He fancies Remus, but only on an aesthetic level. He knows absolutely nothing about him, except that he often brings cheese and ham on rye for lunch.
"Pencils are the original all-rounder," says Frank, in the dingy darkness of the meeting room at one o'clock on Tuesday afternoon. "Everyone uses them. Everyone needs them. Come rain or shine, recession or no, people will. Need. Pencils. I want all of you to remember that."
James lets out a low, whistling breath. "William Wallace, eat your heart out," he mutters. Sirius snorts.
Frank shoots them a look, the disapproving teacher.
"However," he continues boldly on, turning away from them again, "there's a whole world of suppliers out there, and we have to give our customers reason to return to us. Times are hard, economically speaking, and there's tough, tough competition. We have to remember to stress our variety, our high ecological standard, our loyalty scheme..."
Sirius easily begins to block him out. Every week it's the same, as though it's actually possible to convince people that, other than in price, there's actually a difference between one pencil and another. He glances, bored, around the rest of the circle, landing first on Peter Pettigrew, stuffing a Miniature Hero Bounty into his mouth, then at Remus next to him. He's hunched up in his chair, staring very intently at a stain on the carpet, eyes very clearly glazed.
He barely blinks as he nibbles on his lower lip. He has on this sweet grey cardigan, the sleeves of which he tugs down past his wrists as if he’s cold, though the room is hot. He looks up and catches Sirius staring and blinks once, slowly. His lips quirk up into a weary smile, but he looks away before Sirius can mirror it.
When the meeting ends, Remus is the first out of his seat while the others stroll leisurely behind. Remus always looks busy. Perhaps he actually enjoys his job, though Sirius doubts it. He’d like to ask him some time. He’s sure what the answer would be, but he feels as if somehow Remus would answer the question better than anybody else in the office would, even James, who’s frankly hilarious.
Sirius watches Remus walk all the way back to his cubicle across the room, then returns to his own when it becomes clear Remus isn't going to look up again.
"Well, that was intensely painful," James declares when Sirius sits down.
"It was, wasn't it?"
"What's Frank even doing as team leader? He'd better lead a group of - " He pauses to hiccough, indigestion from having to eat his lunch too fast - "a group of toddlers."
James talks about toddlers a lot, given that he has one. A little one. Harry. Sometimes James brings him into the office and he sits on the floor shredding papers for everyone.
"He can't help being useless," says Sirius, returning to his game of FreeCell, "and it's better than having someone who's, you know, actually serious."
"S'pose," James yawns, stretching his back. "God, another four hours to go."
"Hang in there, buddy," says Sirius, double-clicking the Ace of Hearts.
"Why is everything more exhausting in winter? I thought the days were supposed to be shorter." Clearly not in the mood to do any work, he glances despondently out of the floor-to-ceiling windows where the sky is already growing gloomy. "And Lily wants to go to this play tonight."
"A play?"
"This bloody – I don't know, this improvised, verbatim… thing."
"Ah yes, I've heard about that one."
"Shut up, you know what I mean," says James, rubbing his eyes. "Personally, I'd rather she go with a friend and have me stay at home with the littl'un. But no, he has to go to her bloody sister's so… seeing them will be a joy."
"You should've asked me! I loved having Harry last time."
"Yeah, Lil's still not entirely convinced sushi was an appropriate lunch for a three-year-old."
"He liked it," says Sirius. "It was all I had in."
"Who only has sushi in their fridge?" says James, finally starting to address the large pile of papers on his desk. "Don’t tell me you didn't at least have oven chips in. See, she'll let him have chips, but not fish. Mum logic. Hey, did you get my e-mail?"
"Which one?"
"The one with the baby and the Jack Daniels."
"Oh, yeah. Thanks. It was funny."
"Come on, it was hilarious. Oh whatever. Here, give these to Pete, would you?"
Sirius drags a Five of Clubs about the screen, tip of his tongue between his teeth in concentration. "Give your own damn papers to him."
James doesn't. The papers sit stubbornly on his desk for at least an hour, until Sirius, exhausted from his intense card game, gets thirsty. On his way to the vending machines he snatches up James' papers and makes his way down the long line of prison cells, stopping at the one where Peter is often to be found making something out of paperclips and rubber bands or, very occasionally, working.
His chair is empty. Beside it, Remus sits staring at his computer screen, cheek resting on his fist, brow furrowed, looking thoroughly confused.
Sirius glances around the room and back again.
"Where's Pete?" he asks, and Remus jumps so hard his elbow slips from the desk entirely with a whump. Sirius bites back a laugh. "Sorry, you were really concentrating there, weren't you?"
"No no, not too much," says Remus, glancing up with a smile. "But I’ve no idea where he is, sorry."
"That's a shame. Got a present for him." Sirius drops the whole stack of papers on Peter's desk with a smack, rattling several empty orange juice cans. He sits himself down in Peter’s empty chair, having gained Remus' attention. "So what’s happening on this side of town?"
"Oh, not a lot. I’m engaged in the thrilling task of trying to comprehend last month's surfeit of 2Bs."
"That sounds intense."
"It is just that."
Remus' eyes are back on his computer screen now, pen twiddling between his fingers, and Sirius doesn't want to bother him but he doesn't feel like going back to work yet either. Or FreeCell, at least. He swivels on Peter's chair. Then he says, "I was just on my way to the vending machine. Want anything?"
Remus seems surprised by the offer.
"I’m alright, thanks," he says, then seems to think better of it. "Actually, could you get us a Twix?" He digs in his pocket for change, but Sirius tells him not to worry and returns minutes later, dropping the chocolate bar into Remus' desk tidy. He's pleased that Remus doesn't seem to mind this gesture, despite the fact that they barely ever speak to one another.
"Want half?" he offers, opening it.
Sirius does, but he refuses out of politeness, cracking the tab on his Minute Maid.
"You always get those," he remarks.
Remus gives a little smile as he bites into a bar. "I didn’t realise anyone noticed."
Now it sounds as though Sirius has been watching him, which he hasn’t, he just has a particularly good eye for detail, but Remus isn’t to know this, so it continues to sound as though Sirius has been watching him.
"I know what everybody gets," Sirius says quickly, covering himself. He peers at the sweet wrappers in Peter’s bin. "Pete always gets Twirls. James is on Minstrels."
Remus gives a quiet huff of laughter. "Quite the detective," he says. He takes another bite, and a little bit of caramel sticks to his lip before he licks it away. "These are honestly the highlight of my day."
"Yeah?"
"Well. Apart from seeing my cat and drinking myself to sleep with tea. Watching Heartbeat."
Sirius laughs, a little too loudly perhaps, but it’s more in surprise that Remus, elusive as he is, has a sense of humour. He’s about to reply when Peter comes bounding back down the small carpeted pathway, two Twirls and a can of Minute Maid in his hand. He looks confused when he sees Sirius, as though he can't quite remember if this really is his own seat or not.
"Just some faxes for you there, mate," Sirius explains, standing up. He doesn't want to. He wants to stay here and pick at Remus some more and figure out why he never speaks to him.
"Oh right, cheers!" Peter bristles, bustling round Sirius to plonk himself down in the seat.
Sirius nods. "Right. See you later, Pete. Remus." He smiles and, wonderfully, Remus smiles right back.
"What was making you squawk so much over there?" James asks when Sirius returns. "You sound like a seal when you laugh, you know."
"Remus. He's funny."
"Is he?" James raises his eyebrows with a bored, Tuesday afternoon sigh. "Never knew that."
"Mr McCarthy... Mr McCarthy... Mr - yes, I realise that, Mr McCarthy, but you see... no. No, of course not. No, I understand, I... but look, we don't actually have any control over - sir, I'm really going to have to ask you to calm down, this is merely..."
Remus wants to say it, really he does. This is merely an issue over some bloody pencils, you insufferable old twat. But he has to remain polite. It says so in his employee hand booklet.
He has been on the phone to Mr McCarthy for over twenty minutes now. It's past five o'clock. He could, legally, put the phone down. But the polite idiot deep within himself won't allow him to do it, in the same way it won't allow him to stand up to people who push in front of him in the bus queue, or to turn down Jehovah's Witnesses who come to his door clutching copies of Watchtower, and he lets Mr McCarthy abuse him for a further seven minutes before, finally, the old fool hangs up himself.
Well. It's definitely one of Remus' more successfully-handled complaints.
Free at last, he switches off his computer, shrugs his coat on and wraps his scarf around his neck, patting his pockets for his keys. He says goodbye to Dorcas, the only person left in the office, then goes out into the hallway and hits the button for the lift. Inside, he pulls out his phone to check for messages. It’s a habit, though he doesn't really know who he's expecting to send him any. Mark, perhaps? Jonathan?
"Whoa, whoa, whoa," comes a familiar voice, and a hand stops the doors, forcing them to move apart again. It’s Sirius who bounds in, grinning. "Sorry. Went all the way to the stairs thinking I'd try to be healthy and then thought, you know, fuck it. It's a long way down."
"Definitely know the feeling."
Remus does, too. He has a new "teetotal resolution" practically every other week, usually made when either a) drunk, or b) hungover.
"James is trying to get me to go to the gym with him. Can you believe that?"
"God, no. I don't know why anyone would go to the gym by choice."
"Right?" Sirius chuckles. "It's like, you work in an office, you hardly require a six pack."
He says this, and yet it’s obvious Sirius isn't exactly in bad shape himself. At any rate, it isn't as though he tries to hide anything. Even now, his collar and tie are so loose that a rather large portion of skin is on show, and his shirts are always tightly-fitted, impractical things.
Don't stare, Remus. Do not stare.
Remus imagines wearing his own work shirt so low. He'd probably get done for public indecency.
Inwardly he marvels at the fact Sirius is talking to him at all, when before today the only words they’ve ever really exchanged have been polite greetings and goodbyes. It was a surprise, and not at all an unwelcomed one, when Sirius bought him that Twix this afternoon, but Remus is still unsure as to why he did.
They seem to be in the lift a long time, and when the doors finally haul themselves open again Sirius finds something to say. Remus is halfway through a cheery goodbye when Sirius asks him, "What are you doing on Friday?"
"Friday... morning? Friday afternoon?" Remus pauses. "Friday evening?"
Sirius laughs. "The middle one. Afternoon. We always go out at lunch, you never come. You should."
Truthfully, Friday office pub breaks have never much appealed to Remus. It's all too bleak, too depressing, too laddy, even with the constant presence that is Marlene Legs'n'Hair. They all come back tipsy and annoy him all afternoon when he's overworked and overtired and wants nothing more than to crawl into bed but still has four hours to go.
Maybe it would be easier if he was a part of it. But when he first arrived at Pollock, he'd been so anxious about the idea of drinking in the day time that he'd refused all the friendly offers, and people simply stopped bothering to ask. He's the office bore. He knows that. He embraces it. Well, he tries to. It's a bit disheartening, to be honest, like being the maudlin kid at school who never has a partner for trips because all he talks about is death. It's Remus' fault that he's left out of things, but that doesn't make him any less aware of it.
Then again, having Caradoc swagger over, clap Remus on the shoulder and say, "Come for a pint, Lupin, you definitely need it, you great queer," is a lot different to having Sirius Black give him a friendly, hopeful smile, saying he should come, but not demanding it.
So Remus bites back an excuse from the vast catalogue in his head and says, "Yes, yes alright," and this time he finishes his goodbye properly.
When he gets home, Jonathan's thrown up on the living room carpet, and the people in the flat above are having noisy sex.