Life After Death Part II: Dream

Author’s note: 18 pages a record for the longest complete fanfiction I’ve ever written. Whoot for winter break and all of the free time it gives me. :~)



“I love you”
Sirius slurs lurching against the doorframe, Remus, and anything else vaguely in the general vicinity. Remus makes a noncommittal noise and tugs his friend by the arm.
“the couch is this way Sirius”
Sirius drapes his entire black leather clad form across Remus, who staggers barely missing a small table in his cramped apartment.
“No I really mean it”
Sirius looks up at him fondly from under incredibly long dark lashes and Remus schools his face to blankness, this is so very much not the time.
“I really love you”
Sirius reaches up towards Remus’ face and Remus removes his hand to a safer area before half dragging him onto the couch.
“that is as it may be”
Remus makes sure all of Sirius limbs are draped in the general area of the couch.
“But I am not, nor ever have been a woman, and you’ll most certainly feel differently come morning”
And that’s the way it is Remus thinks. No matter his personal feelings on the subject.


The train jerks sideways and Remus comes awake. His neck is cramped from sleeping sitting up and for a few moments he can’t remember wear he is. Then it comes back to him, and he sighs and closes his eyes, he liked the dream better. It’s after the war, the second one, and they’re all dead, Sirius, everyone is dead and gone. Yet Remus is still alive for reasons he can’t understand and on his way to visit his son. He searches around next to him until he finds the small package; it’s a toy truck for Teddy. A Muggle truck that you have to push yourself and Remus hopes it’s an appropriate gift for a child Teddy’s age. He wishes Teddy’s mother were still alive she would be so much better at this then he is. Teddy deserves to have a parent survive the war and it should have been her, not Remus. Remus closes his eyes and wills away the grief and guilt that always comes when he thinks about Tonks. It isn’t even that he feels guilty for loving Sirius more then he loved her, but that he is terribly afraid he never loved her to begin with. He visits her grave every year at the anniversary of the war’s end, brings flowers, sits and tells her about Teddy. He grieves for her once a year, but Sirius he grieves for with every breath. The train stops and Remus gathers up the little truck and leaves to go meet his son.
Later Remus stands at the window of his flat watching the sun go down. The visit had gone rather well he thought. Teddy grew by leaps and bounds these days, getting bigger every time Remus sees him. Teddy’s eyes are particularly striking now, large and dark.
“From his mother. The my side of the family, the Black’s side”
Tonks mother had pointed out when Remus had commented on it. Remus had studied the little boys eyes trying to see Tonks there and only seeing Sirius.
Now he cracks the window slightly leaning against the sill and lights a cigarette. A long time ago before the first war, he had taken up smoking in fit of depression. Somewhere in the beginning of the war he had stopped. When Sirius had come back from Azkaban Sirius had started smoking again and Remus had let him smoke for the two of them. Now after the second war, Remus had started. More then anything it gave him something to do with his hands. He shuts his eyes and leans his head against the pane.


Remus wakes because something is wrong. It takes him a minute to realize where he is and then feel what it is that’s woken him. Sirius is shaking. His whole body racked by convulsions and he’s curled up on his side wrapped into himself.
“I’m fine, go back to sleep”
Sirius voice is low and far too tightly controlled for Remus to believe him. Instead he reaches out putting his arms around the other man, holding him close. Remus feels how thin Sirius is, how much his bones jut out under the skin. Sirius might be good at hiding it, most of the time in front of most people, but Remus has never forgotten what a toll Azkaban has taken on him. Remus closes his eyes and presses his face into the back of Sirius’ neck smelling Sirius and what ever it is he uses to wash his hair.
“ Promise me” He can’t help that his voice his shaking as much as Sirius is.
“Promise me, you won’t leave. Not again. I couldn’t, can’t loose you again.”
Sirius stills then. Remus hears a rustle and Sirius turns so he’s facing him on the bed.
“I can’t make any promises, but I’m not planning on going any where any time soon”
His voice is pitched light and Remus hears more then sees the smile.


Remus’ head snaps up and he stubs out his cigarette on the windowsill. This is ridiculous and getting him nowhere. He paces back and forth across his small flat for a moment before, deciding he would be better off going out tonight, in the company of others would be safer. He apperates to the Leaky Caldron, usually he prefers to walk but tonight he just doesn’t feel up to it. He orders bourbon, a fondness Sirius never let him live down, and scans the pub. Over at the back a flash of red catches his eyes and he walks towards it. He stops by the table and the young man waves a hand at him without looking.
“Sit”
Then looks up. Remus recognizes George Weasley. The younger man looks vaguely surprised.
“Lupin.”
Remus nods
“Hello George”
He sits. The younger man studies him for several minutes. Remus become acutely aware his hair is almost completely grey at this point, and he still wears the same beat up clothes and old sweaters he always has, but George looks older too. His red hair is longer then it had been during the war, curling around his ears in an unkempt way that makes Remus think he hasn’t been to see Molly in a while. There are lines starting to appear on George’s face that Remus knows shouldn’t be there for another couple decades or so. The Weasley twin seems also to be growing some kind of stubble on his upper lip that doesn’t become him at all. Which is a pity Remus thinks, because the twins had always been very good looking men. He stills that part of his mind immediately.
“I wasn’t actually expecting to see you here”
George’s voice is curious but holds no hostility.
“If you were planning on meeting someone I don’t want to interrupt”
Remus makes to get up and George waves at him to sit back down.
“No, no nothing like that. I’m really happy to see you; it’s been a while. It’s just that usually Draco’s the one who stops by this time of night”
Remus sits forehead wrinkling.
“Draco? Draco Malfoy?”
George nods. Remus digests this piece of information. He can’t remember the last time he saw Draco Malfoy, some time during the war probably maybe even Hogwarts. At any rate it’s been a long time. He remembers when Lucius and Narssica had been killed. The ministry had gone slightly crazy over a Death Eater still being on the loose. Draco had survived he remembered that, and then disappeared, there had been rumors he had fled the country. Evidently he was back in Britain now through, and spending his time with a Weasley. Very interesting. Remus abruptly realizes he’d been sitting there silently for the last few minutes. He belatedly searches his brains for something to say.
“So how’s the shop”
George smiles at him.
“It’s fine, lots of work of course but I have a bloke who comes in three times a week to help out, really good with numbers, which is good ‘cause I’m not. The rest of the time I tinker around in the workshop. Always have to be coming out with new tricks see, it’s our trade mark, something new every time you visit Weasley’s Wizarding Wheezes.”
He sounds enormously proud of this and Remus smiles back at him.
“So what about you though?” George takes a drink of his beer.
“What have you been up to these days?”
Remus raises his eyebrows.
“I don’t think I’ve been ‘up to’ anything”
George actually grins.
“But I did take a job at Hogwarts a couple years back.”
Remus takes a sip of his own drink
“Not as a professor, although McGonagall did offer”
Forced down his throat was closer but Remus doesn’t mention this
“But I decided my teaching days are over, so I’m the librarian now”
George frowns.
“What happened to Madam Pince?”
“Disappeared during the war”
Silence fell for a moment as nether of them can think of anything appropriate to say.
“Well it’s a good job for you though”
George finally says looking up at Remus
“I can image you as a librarian”
Remus’ snorts
“Old and stuffy you mean”
“Not at all!”
George grins at him
“Well, maybe more prone to book learning then I am, but then isn’t everybody. Seriously Ron was way better at school then I was.”
Remus smiles
“How is your brother”
“Ron?”
George frowns slightly
“Fine I guess. He’s. . . he’s never really been the same after the war and all”
He looks down at his beer Remus doesn’t push him. They talk a little while longer about politics, Quidditch and Harry, before Remus gets up.
“I should be getting home, it’s getting late and I have work in the morning”
George nods and stands himself
“Yeah me too, and Merlin only knows what’ll happen if I don’t open the shop on time tomorrow. Someone might have an emergency itching powder shortage.”
Remus smiles at that. George is a little taller then he is Remus realizes quite the achievement considering he’s never been a small man thin yes, but not short. George’s shoulders are broader too but he slumps in a way that makes him look smaller, less threatening. The two men head out together into the back ally, where Remus not really knowing what else to do, apparates to his own apartment.
They meet each other a few more times over the next couple months at the Leaky Caldron, but still Remus feels he should be more surprised to find himself outside of Weasley Wizard Wheezes. He enters the shop carefully but is surprised to find it is incredibly neat inside. Everything stacked along shelves and highly organized. George is behind the counter dressed in one of Molly’s notorious sweaters doing something with what looks like an account book. He has a pair of reading glasses, of all things, perched on his nose. Remus coughs, and George looks up, startled.
“Lupin?”
Remus holds out his hands palms up.
“just Remus, please.”
George hastily removes his glasses
“Remus what are you doing here?”
“I’m looking for a gift for Teddy”
A moment of silence and Remus adds
“Teddy, my son”
“ah, yes I’d forgotten you and Tonks. . .”
George trails off then gathers himself
“does he live with you then”
“Teddy? No he lives with his grandmother, Tonks’ mother. I visit him on the weekends.”
Remus wonders why this is suddenly so awkward. Perhaps because the twins had been some of the only children to ever acknowledge him and Sirius, but then not much had escaped the twins.
“Well”
George moves out from around the counter
“I don’t think there’s much here that’ll interest a child as young as he is, but let me see. . .”
He putters among the boxes for a while. Remus tries hard not to watch the way his hair curls on the back of his neck.
“here we go.”
George comes up with something that looks like a wooden spoon rapped in shiny clear wrapping of some sort. George hands it to Remus, looking pleased. Remus turns it over in his hands.
“What is it?”
“a spoon”
Remus looks at George, George smiles at him.
“It sends out colored sparks when you use it and makes a sort of a exploding sound. Should be great for a kid to bang around on things with. As long as it doesn’t scare the Hell out of him first.”
“He’s sturdy”
Remus brings it over to the counter and George rings it up for him, and puts it in a bag.
“would you like to come up stairs for spot of tea?”
George asks handing over the bag.
“it’s just about time for my break.”
Remus thinks about it for a moment then shrugs.
“a cup of tea would be nice, thank you”
George flips the sign to closed then leads the way into the back of the shop. Remus worries for a moment that maybe one of them is being too forward; maybe he’s given the wrong massage, but then tells himself not to worry so much. George is a friend, this is only a cup of tea, and he doesn’t even know if George swings that way. George unlocks the door to the flat above the shop and Remus walks into utter chaos. Where the shop below was neat and well organized, the apartment looks like a house elf’s worst nightmare, or as if a rampaging herd of hippogriffs had just visited.
“sorry about the mess”
George states cheerfully plowing his way through books, old prototype tricks, clothing and odds and ends into the kitchen. Remus follows wondering if he should be afraid for his safety, and if Molly ever visits here, some how he things the answer to the last is not often. Once in the kitchen he looks about for a clear space to sit. Although there is a table and chairs they all seem to be covered with things.
“just move something”
George is busy filling the kettle with one hand and using his wand to light a burner with the other. Remus tries to find the chair with the least amount of stuff on it and gives up, instead wanders about the kitchen. A door stands open at the other end of the kitchen and Remus wanders over to it. It leads into what looks like a workshop, small and crammed with what seems to be potion apparatus, spell ingredients and trick prototypes. Something on the wall ketches his eyes and he moves over to it. It’s a muggle photograph in black and white, made strange by its motionlessness. Remus studies it before with a small shock he realizes it’s of Fred Weasley. It must have been taken sometime shortly after the twins left Hogwarts but before they joined the Order. Fred is standing on what looks like a street in muggle London peering at the camera like he’s not sure what’s supposed to be happening. Remus hears a small sound behind him and terns to find George holding two miss-matched mugs. Remus knows he really shouldn’t say anything, bringing up George’s dead twin is such a bad idea, but he can’t help it.
“why a muggle picture?”
George glances at it.
“the only one I had. Well the only resent one anyway. Mum has wizarding portraits of us from after we left school. Did any way, she took it down after. . . should ask her for it one of these days. Tea? ”
Remus takes the mug and follows George back into the kitchen.
“besides”
George waves his wand at the table and the stuff heaped on two of the chairs flies off onto the floor, Remus tries not to wince.
“I don’t know whether it would be better or worse if it talked”
On an impulse Remus touches the other man’s shoulder in a gesture of sympathy before he sits.
“So will I see you at the Leaky Caldron on Sunday?”
George asks standing up again. Remus wonders what he could be after this time until George comes back with a coffee tin that appears to contain chocolate biscuits.
“Ron and some others’ll be there.”
Remus nods and takes the biscuit offered him.
“Sure, I’ll try to be there”
George smiles.


“Sirius? Sirius look at me!”
There’s desperation there but Remus won’t beg. He repeats it over and over to himself in his mind, he will not beg. Sirius won’t look at him, instead he hunches against the doorframe looking old and tired in his leather jacket, dirty and blood stained clothes. Remus curses the war and wonders when was the last time Sirius slept. Then curses himself for caring about Sirius like that at a time like this.
“Sirius, please. Do you really think I’m capable of this, that I would do these things? Do you really think I’m a Death Eater, Sirius? That I’d betray James, Lily, little Harry and you for Merlin’s sake! You’ve known me for how long? We’ve been living together. . .”
Remus trails off, staring at Sirius unmoving form. Look at me. look at me, damn you, he thinks but Sirius doesn’t look up. I love you, he thinks but doesn’t say it, suddenly feeling so very, very tired.
“I’m sorry, Remus.”
Sirius voice is hoarse, and painful sounding. Remus wonders how many packs he’s been smoking, but it’s not like Remus can blame him, not with none of them ever getting any sleep and reports of deaths coming in every night. He runs a hand over his face.
“So it comes down to this then. James or me, like always”
He’s voice sounds wooden, too tired to be angry. Finally, finally Sirius looks up, meets his eyes.
“Don’t. Please Remus, don’t make this harder. . . ”
But Remus doesn’t stay to listen, just grabs his bag and pushes past Sirius out into the hall and down the stairs.


Remus shakes his head and focuses, before pushing open the door and stepping into the Leaky Caldron. He orders a glass of bourbon then pushes his way to the back, to the table where George and him always sit. Tonight George stands and waves him over and Remus sees two other people are already sitting at the table. He pulls up a chair and nods to the two. Ron is unmistakable despite looking very different from last time Remus saw him. Tall, like George but with a much squarer, stockier build. Remus would never have imagined Ron Weasley would grow up to be a big man but that seems to be have been the case. He’s wearing muggle jeans and a short-sleeved button up shirt in blue plaid, which Remus is not quite sure goes with his hair. He smiles at Remus then focuses back on his glass of beer pointedly ignoring the other man at the table. And this must be Draco Malfoy; Remus thinks, looking at the other man.
Draco is Ron’s age but from his face Remus would peg him at Georges’. He’s wearing, a dark gray muggle suit with a wizard’s cape over it and a very pale green silk shirt underneath. He’s also wearing gloves although they are indoors and quite close to the fireplace. His hair is pulled back from his face, in a gesture almost too much like his father, although Draco is all his mother, in his fine lines and sharp, sharp angles. When he looks up at Remus and murmurs something, Remus sees his eyes are all his own though. A chill goes through him, he’s only seen eyes like that a very few times, torture victims and Azkaban prisoners mostly. George slaps an arm around his shoulders jerking him back to reality.
“Remus did you see the Quidditch game last Wednesday? Didn’t the Essex’s Elves kick arse or what?”
Remus in fact hadn’t watched a Quidditch game since teaching at Hogwarts, but luckily Ron joins in with gusto.
“Their Keeper is something, isn’t she. Brenda. What I wouldn’t give to have her on my team!”
Ron leans across the table enthusiastically going over a blow-by-blow account of the game with George. Remus sits back and drinks his bourbon watching the firelight play across George’s hair. He looks up and sees Draco watching him from across the table. He nods at him.
“Draco, it’s been a while. What are you doing now?”
Draco raises his eyebrows
“as far as work? I’m a stock broker.”
Remus frowns
“I’ve never heard of a wizard stock broker.”
“they’re not common in this country. Although that is changing”
Draco reaches into his cape and takes out a cigarette and lights it, then offers Remus one, who takes it.
“I went to school for it, in Japan, where they are common”
“Japan, really?”
Remus lights his cigarette and takes a drag.
Draco nods blowing smoke out his nose then terns to Ron.
“and what have you been doing these last few years Weasley?”
Ron looks taken aback that Draco would be talking to him.
“I’ve been working at St. Mungo’s”
Draco’s eyebrows arch
“Really? I thought you where an Aurora? Trained and all that. Potters right hand man”
Ron looks uncomfortable and shifts slightly.
“I was, trained to be an Aurora I mean. Good at it too. But a couple years ago I decided it wasn’t for me. The life and all”
George breaks into the conversation
“Ron’s a Healer in the hospice wing at St. Mungo’s now. It’s a hard job I don’t think I could do it, but Ron’s great.”
They all consider this. Ron moves about in his seat.
“it’s nothing really, just I am good at it and it’s a good job, you know. Someone has to do it.”
Remus thinks about spending everyday caring for the dieing and shivers slightly. He’s seen death more times then he wants to think about and he thinks he agrees with George. He couldn’t do it. He looks over the table, Ron looks embarrassed and Draco looks strangely impressed.
“and how is Granger? You two still living together?”
Draco waves his wand and an ashtray appears, he stubs out his cigarette. Ron looks uncomfortable again.
“She’s. . . well she’s Hermione and yes we still live together. . .sort of”
Remus frowns, there’s something going on here, subtext he’s not quite reading maybe he should go see Hermione one of these days, see what’s going on. The conversation terns to other things. Politics of course, his job at Hogwarts, what the school is like these days, who’s teaching. Finally they get around to Harry and Ginny’s wedding and Remus feels slightly guilty because he was invited but didn’t go. When they get up to leave, Ron shakes his hand.
“nice to see you again. . . ”
He hesitates
“Lupin”
Remus grips the other man’s hand
“Remus, please Ron, it’s Remus”
Behind Ron, he sees George smile at him.
As they leave the Leaky Caldron he feels a slight touch to his elbow and turns.
“it was through.”
Draco looks at him from his haunted eyes. Remus thinks he almost smiles
“nice to see you again”
George and Ron come out arms thrown around each other’s shoulders talking of Quidditch again. Remus and Draco watch them go.
“The Weasley men are something special aren’t they? Good people”
Draco’s voice is low, slightly wistful. Remus gives him a look and Draco’s lips pull into a thin, sardonic smile.
“I’ve learned to tell the difference.”
Then he too is gone and Remus turns up his caller to the rain that’s started to fall and heads home.
Several days later Remus leans against the windowsill of his apartment thinking of the past, thinking of his life. He’s a careful man, and his life is slow and ordered. It always has been, the control he never really has had, his greats asset, his greatest fear. All his life Remus lives by routine. His existence controlled and organized, he waits for others to do what he can’t, to give him direction to give him life. If the wolf were not there things might have been different but Remus can’t afford to think of what might have been. To Remus control is survival, but he knows it’s also death. Suffocating and slow but just as sure as a sudden loss of control would be. He knows what he needs. He needs chaos. Something to come into his life and throw all the pieces apart, ruin his order and strain his control. He’ll complain and fight it, but in the end he knows he needs it, needs it to stop him from smothering himself in his own orderliness, stop him from lying down and dying. He needs something like Sirius in his life again, chaos against the order. Sirius isn’t here anymore, but he knows someone who is, someone else who is just as much a force of chaos as Sirius ever was.
This time when he terns up at George’s door he comes with a proposition, a plan, and hopes to Hell it’ll work.
“roommates?”
George stares at him.
“you want to live with me?”
Remus takes another look around the chaos that is George’s life, in the back towards the workshop something explodes and green fowl smelling smoke fills the kitchen and leaks out into the hall.
“Yes”
Remus says
“yes please. That is, if you’re interested. I’m not asking for anything, you understand. I’m not looking for. . .”
He trails off unsure of where this is going, then squares his shoulders metaphorically and goes on.
“I’m not looking for a romantic relationship. I can’t handle that. Not yet. But I can’t live alone any longer ether, and I would like to live with you. . .”
He stops again and squints up at George now haloed in green acrid smoke. Slowly, slowly, George smiles.
“I think I would like that too”
He’s grinning now and holds open the door.
“would you like to come in? I think I have some tea somewhere about”
Something else explodes and Remus takes his future into his own hands and smiles.
“Tea would be lovely”