Work Text:
From Monday to Friday, Remus had to pass by the city’s more hidden viewpoint on his way to work.
Well, maybe he didn’t have to, but it was a shorter path, and he was always running late, so… in some way, yes, he had to.
When he had accepted the headteacher position, he was only thinking about paying his rent and his cat’s medicine—the old Siamese cat he had found in the trash nearly seven years before, with a broken leg, and that had sadly passed away one year after he got the promotion.
But he hadn’t thought about the implications, about how his place in school would change; and maybe some people would say he had to be happy, because he had got a promotion, but truth was… he had always dreamt of being a teacher, and that’s all.
It was a small school in a small neighbourhood, and being a headteacher meant having less time to talk with his students between classes or during free periods, and dedicating less time to preparing his classes. Also, he felt like being out of time all day.
So every day he took the short path to the school and passed by the viewpoint, and every time he said to himself that he was going to stop there in his way back home, but he was always too tired and busy to do so; he could only think about getting home, eating something, preparing things for the next day and maybe relaxing for some minutes and crying because he missed Whiskers.
He had been in that situation for ten years, and now he was a forty-two-year-old man who didn’t like his job very much and lived alone in a rented apartment on the outskirts of the city.
But that year, something changed.
As the viewpoint was a bit hidden—no many tourists came to that neighbourhood anymore, so the mayor stopped taking care of it—it was strange to see someone there, at least during the week. But one day, on a February evening, Remus did saw someone there, sitting on one of the rocks, watching the sunset.
He couldn’t see more than black curls and some broad shoulders, but only with that, he knew that it wasn’t anyone he had met. And that was even more strange, because although he was not known for having a lot of friends or going out much, he talked with almost every inhabitant in the neighbourhood. However, he was tired and busy, so he kept walking.
Week after week, he kept seeing that person in the viewpoint, every evening when he went back home, and he grew more and more interested in them, but he never got close.
Until one day.
Every year, Remus’s parents tried to be there for Remus’s birthday, or he went to Wales if it was a weekend, but that year, Hope and Lyall’s best friends had gifted them a trip to New York for their anniversary, so Remus’s plans had been cancelled. He was going to celebrate it the next Saturday with his friends, since Kingsley and Mary had a double turn in the hospital that day and couldn’t make it on an appropriate hour, and Amelia and Emmeline were celebrating their anniversary too.
As a little treat for his lonely special day, he had made a chocolate cake and had taken it to work, so his students and coworkers could have some. And that day, when he was returning home, a quarter of the cake saved in a plastic box in his backpack, he passed by the viewpoint again, where the stranger was seated, waiting for the sunset.
He hesitated, changing the weight of his body from one leg to another, until he started moving, as if some kind of magic was leading him. In less than a couple of seconds, he was standing next to the other person, who looked at him with clear eyes and a beautiful face. He forced himself to speak, so he wouldn’t look like some old creep.
“Hi, can I- Am I intruding?”
The stranger stared at him for a moment, making Remus start nibbling his own lip. But they smiled softly and shook their head; they had a pretty smile, even if that was a cheesy thought for a forty-year-old man. The stranger didn’t seem much younger nor older than him.
“Last time I checked, this was a public place.”
Remus nodded and sat beside them with clumsy movements—sometimes he thought his body was longer than it should. They remained in silence for another couple of minutes, while Remus fidgeted with the rope of his backpack.
“You want a piece of cake?”
Now, the stranger did look at him like he was some old creep, but they seemed amused too.
“Is it some kind of… special cake?”
Remus laughed and rubbed his face with his palms, feeling himself blush.
“No, no. It’s just… It’s my birthday,” he blurted out. “I have taken some cake to my job, but there’s still some in there. It’s chocolate’s.”
“Well then, how can a man say no to a piece of chocolate cake, right?”
If you asked Remus, he would have said the same, so he laughed and took out the plastic box that contained the cake. He cut a piece of it with a wooden knife and offered it to the other man with a paper napkin; he took the remaining piece for himself.
» “Happy birthday, by the way.”
“Thanks.”
They ate in silence, one that wasn’t as awkward as someone would have expected, and they watched the sun start to hide.
“Are you the same guy who always walks behind me?” The stranger said. “I heard your footsteps.”
Remus felt himself blushing again, and he thought he was too old for that, but for some reason, he couldn’t help it.
“Yeah, I guess I am… I have been doing it for years, but I haven’t seen anyone here until you.”
“I’m sorry if I disrupted your usual routine.”
“No, it’s fine. I just don’t get it, you live here?”
“No, actually. I live near the centre of the city.”
“And what are you doing here? If you want to answer.”
“A friend recommended it to me when I was becoming burned out at work,” he explained, unconcerned. “She came here some years ago for a weekend trip. It’s a beautiful place.”
“Yeah, it is… And what? Do you start walking every day until you arrive here?”
“No, I still have to work,” the stranger laughed. “But I changed my work hours a bit. I come here by…"
He nodded towards a bike that was hidden between the weeds.
“Oh,” Remus gasped.
“Not a fan of bikes?”
“I have never ridden one. A bike.”
The stranger laughed out loud at that and turned around a bit to watch him. It was the first time he wasn’t looking at the sunset.
“It’s never too late.”
Remus snorted, eating the last bite of the cake.
“I have heard that too many times in the past years.”
“Yeah?” the man asked, eyebrows lifted. “How come?”
“My friends. They think I should quit my job.” He shrugged.
“Don’t like your job? Been there, done that.”
“Not exactly…” Remus sighed. “I am a headteacher. I just wanted to be a teacher, without any other addition.”
“Well, then quit as a headteacher.”
“I can't do that.”
“Why?”
“What if they fire me?” He said, vocalising his fears for the first time. “I’m too old for looking for another job, and even more for moving out and searching for another house.”
“Oh, come on, how old are you?”
“Let’s say I’m not turning forty anymore.”
“Well, me neither, are you calling me old?”
“Oh, no, of course,” Remus replied in an exaggerated tone.
“Then, do it. I may not be from here, but I don't think they have too many teachers.”
“I have never been one for changes, you know?”
“I have to say it again or…?”
“No, no. I get it. It’s never too late.”
“You learn fast!”
They laughed together and kept silent again. Remus knew it was true, that it wasn’t likely that the school would fire him if he asked to become just a regular teacher again, but for the same reason, they needed a headteacher, and there weren’t many options.
He looked at the other man, who smiled faintly, his eyes fixed once again on the horizon. He was handsome, Remus could have believed him if he had said he was still in his early thirties, but it was also true that he himself looked a bit older than he was—bad genetics, he assumed.
It was good, being like that, just sitting with someone and not feeling awkward, but calm. He didn’t remember the last time he did it, the last time he felt like time wasn’t important.
For a second, he had the stupid urge to touch the stranger’s hand, as if they were in a silly teenage romantic film. He was one hundred per cent too old for that kind of thought. Instead, he decided to act as an adult man for once.
“What’s your name?” he asked.
The man looked at him with his eyebrows raised, and Remus thought that maybe he had asked something different from what he pretended to.
“Oh, you want to break the magic?”
“The magic?”
“Being sitting in a viewpoint with a stranger, sharing cake on your birthday, not knowing if you are going to see him again.”
“Aren’t you coming tomorrow?”
“Who knows?”
“Well, then, let’s keep the magic.”
“Perfect.”
“But,” Remus added, trying to conceal his smirk.
“But?”
“You know my birthday. It doesn’t seem fair.”
A laugh that reminded Remus of a bark broke the silence, but he didn’t feel annoyed.
“November the 3rd.”
“Perfect.”
With that, they saw the last rays of sunshine disappearing behind the mountains, and the stars started to show up.
“I should get going,” said the stranger.
They stood up, and ten minutes later, they couldn’t see each other anymore.
The next day, when Remus was returning home from work, he stopped at the viewpoint again.
“So, you’re here”.
The stranger turned around, and he was smiling when he made eye contact with Remus.
“I didn’t say I wouldn’t.”
And they stayed there, not talking much, just watching the sunset, until the sun went out.
“I’m thinking,” Remus said while they were saying their goodbyes. “You know that I’m a headteacher, I think we have an imbalance in the being strangers thing...”
Just as the day before, the stranger let out that loud laugh that didn’t annoy Remus but made him feel somewhat more alive.
“I’m a public defender.”
“That’s good.”
“See you, stranger.”
“Maybe,” he answered, but failed to hide his smile.
They kept going on like that, day after day. And every day, just when they were ready to part ways, they take with them a part of the other.
“You know where I live,” said Remus.
“I have an apartment on Bloomsbury,” the other man replied.
Every day…
“Ey, you know that I own a bike!”
Remus laughed and shrugged, looking sheepish.
“I have a car, but I’m not the best driver.”
Sometimes just silly things,
“You like black all that much, or it just fits your style?” asked Remus the first time the other showed up with a black leather jacket.
“I love it, but my favourite colour is purple,” he said, and then raised an eyebrow.
“Mine is green, but I love black too.”
Sometimes personal details,
“The sunset is just so mystic for me…” the stranger sighed one day, while the sun was hiding. “I kind of flow with that type of thing, the universe having an impact on what happens. What do you think?”
Looking at the horizon, Remus talked about some of the things that occupied his mind when he couldn’t sleep.
“I think there’s a God or a Goddess out there, I just can’t figure out how they are or what they do.”
Sometimes, really deep shit,
“I wish I could see my parents more, you know… But Wales is not that close, and they’re not getting any younger.”
The other man looked a bit reluctant, but after a couple of seconds, he looked right at Remus’s eyes, his piercing grey iris like two peepholes to his soul.
“I wish I could avoid seeing my parents for the rest of my life,” he said, but before Remus could apologise, he went on, “but my adoptive parents are always around, and I couldn’t ask for anything better.”
They didn’t see each other on the weekends. At first, because Remus thought that the other man being there was correlated with him returning home from work, but when he realised that maybe it wasn’t like that, it didn’t feel right to turn up there, where there probably were some teenagers doing their things.
Two months later, Remus didn’t know the name of that man, but he knew an awful amount of things about him. He knew he loved lemon pie but hated lemon ice cream; he knew he realised he was gay at fifteen; he knew he loved summers, but that he got sunburned easily. He knew that his laugh was boisterous and made his insides jump a bit, and that his lips looked pinker in the light of the golden hour.
And he knew that this stranger also had too much information about him, like that his favourite flavour was chocolate, that his last relationship was with a girl named Petra and didn’t end well. He knew that Remus' favourite book was ‘The Werewolf of Paris’ by Guy Endore, but his favourite film was ‘The Land Before Time’, even if it always made him cry.
One Friday evening, a spring storm came over the city, and Remus ran to his house trying to stop the rain with his backpack, but he stopped on his heels when he reached the viewpoint, and he saw a man on a motorbike.
“You can’t go on that with this weather!” he exclaimed, getting closer to him.
The now-barely-stranger turned to look at him, and he was even more beautiful under the rain, with the wet hair framing his face, getting off the bike.
“Well, I don’t think there’s much of a sunset to see today.”
They almost had to scream because of the noise of the drops hitting the floor and the thunder over them.
“Come to my house, you can leave when it stops.”
“I shouldn’t go to a stranger’s apartment, you know… It’s a basic survival tactic.”
“Not riding a bike in a storm is another. And we are not strangers anymore.”
“Aren’t we?” the man said, but Remus could see his smirk even behind his dirty glasses. “We don’t even know each other’s names!”
“Oh, for god's sake, you’re insufferable.”
“I know. And you have too much patience.”
Remus tried not to laugh; he even tried not to smile, but it was so difficult.
“We are going to catch a cold.”
“Oh, your fake umbrella is not helping?”
“Fuck you!” he exclaimed, and now he was really laughing. The other man was, too.
“Not very nice words, teacher.”
“Who are you?” Remus asked, giving up with the backpack thing.
“You tell me, if we are not strangers.”
They were looking into each other’s eyes, and in some moment they had moved closer. Remus opened his mouth and let out a breathless laugh.
“You are a smart man, with a great heart, so bad taste in films,” he answered, then he looked at the other man’s expression going softer, and he added one more thing: “And a laugh that makes me feel like I’m in my twenties again.”
One second, two, three.
“All of you makes me feel like I’m in my twenties again,” said the other man. Remus giggled, like a teenager. Then the man continued: “And I’m so glad you think we are not strangers anymore, because I want to do something that I haven’t done with a stranger in ages. But you’re a very snobbish music man, with the kindest personality I have ever met.”
Suddenly, they were closing the few steps that separated them; they grabbed each other’s faces, and they were merely inches apart.
“I’m Remus, by the way. Remus Lupin.”
“I’m Sirius, Sirius Black.”
And their lips collided, there under the rain, with the sun behind the clouds but getting lower with each second that passed. It was fast at first, as if they were taking advantage of the time in case that was just an illusion; but then they slowed down, breathing into each other’s mouths, caressing their cheeks, savouring the moment.
They kissed, and kissed, and kissed. And their clothes were soaked, their bodies trembled because of the cold, their lips started to hurt, but they couldn't let go of each other.
Remus moved his hand so he could grab Sirius from behind his head, hooking his fingers in his hair, and he let out a small sigh when Sirius bit his lower lip.
Sirius. Sirius. Sirius.
It was a wonderful name.
They kept kissing until they stopped feeling the water falling down, the storm continuing its way not so far from there.
“You still shouldn’t go on that bike,” Remus murmured, heart beating in his ears. “The road is too slippery.”
“Hmm,” Sirius nodded, more focused on kissing the corner of Remus’s lips than on his words. “I think now I can go to your home.”
“Yeah…” he agreed. “You can.”
And then they were kissing again, and the sun was nowhere to be seen, but they didn’t miss the sunset.
»“Oh, and also…” Remus said between kisses. “I’m not a headteacher anymore.”