Chapter Text
Remus likes the way that Conor walks out onto the stage like he owns the place. He does, but Remus had picked up his special one morning last week after a particularly disappointing one night stand. The DVD sat in the window of some charity shop that he doesn’t remember the name of and could probably never find again. It wasn’t displayed nicely like the Friends boxset or the chipped ukulele, just thrown on the top of a pile in the corner, probably not even meant to be displayed. Conor’s face had looked up at him, seeming to whisper ‘I invited you to play at my club on Tuesday and you barely know who I am.’ Remus had handed £3 to the bored looking teen at the counter and spent an hour of his morning watching Conor walk across that stage like he owned the place. So, he knows that Conor walks like that everywhere.
“Hello. I’m Conor Vance and I’m the 26-year-old who last week put mouthwash on his penis,” Conor opens, flashing a grin at the audience, “Just going to let that sink in, much like I did at the time.” He pauses to allow the audience to laugh, and Remus thinks this story probably isn’t true, although he wouldn’t be completely surprised if it was.
“I’ll give you the story. I was in a nightclub.” Conor pauses as a single snort comes from somewhere to Remus’ left. “I didn’t do it there, I’m not a total weirdo,” he directs at the snorter. “Just like,’ he starts as he mimes shaking a bottle onto his crotch with one hand while pumping his fist to imaginary music with the other, “freshen your breath M’lady?”
“Anyway, in this particular nightclub is a woman who’s willing to fuck me. Women who are willing to fuck me – very rare creatures. They’re a lot like unicorns. You have to approach them very slowly, very quietly. Have a net.” Looking at Conor’s face, Remus knows this is a purely humorous statement.
“We get chatting, we get flirting, we get drinking. About two hours later she’s like, ‘So, what do I have to say to get you into bed?’ and I was like, ‘That.’ Fucking nailed it in one. Did you practice that in front of a mirror? That was immaculate. So, we go back to my place and we’re about to get down to the…” Conor trails off, seemingly searching for the right words. Instead of saying any words at all, though, he proceeds to emit long, drawn out noises, all the while grimacing. “Sorry, I always find it weird talking about sex on stage, not because I’m not CRUSHING IT,” he shouts suddenly, tensing his arms in front of his body and quite possibly frightening a shaken looking girl in the front row, “but just because I’m very aware that this is my face. It’s not a good face for sex stories, it’s too young, look at this baby face.” He points, circling his finger around his face. “I’m 26 and not a fucking hair.”
“Anyway, I realised that because I’ve been in a nightclub for a couple of hours, because it was a hot, sweaty, underground nightclub and because obviously I had been throwing shapes.” Conor emphasises the last words by moving his arms in a way that, frankly, barely resembles dancing at all. “If you’re not laughing, it’s because you’re turned on.”
“I realised that I was no longer, you know, pristine, with my little ‘cocknor’.” Remus huffs a laugh, following it up with a cough that he attempts to suppress. He casts his mind to the pack of cigarettes in his pocket and contemplates quitting for a second, but only for a second.
“I decided to excuse myself, to go into the bathroom to do the ‘Gentleman’s Wash’ that we sometimes do just before sex in the sink to make sure it’s all fresh and-” He stops abruptly, looking out into the audience before pointing at no one in particular. “Fuck you to every guy that just bailed on me. You absolute full of shit liars . Sitting beside your partners like, ‘I’ve got no idea what he’s talking about.’ I know every single man in this room has washed his dick in a sink. That is a fact. Lie to your partners, do not lie to me. I know you. You’ve all got the same brain as I do. One day, you walked into the bathroom and saw the sink and went, ‘Why is it that height?’ That’s why it’s that height. If it was only for your hands it’d be up here so you could see the dirt.” He mimes washing his hands just inches away from his face. “But it’s not, is it? It’s in no man’s land. Choose your own adventure.” Conor clearly feels like that joke was so good that he has enough time to take a swig from the bottle of water at the edge of the stage before the audience has calmed down.
“So,” he continues after gulping down half the bottle and throwing it back onto the floor, not bothering to make sure it landed upright, “I’m in there, sprucing the place up and I was very, very drunk. My drunk brain saw the mouthwash and went, ‘Oh, that tastes way better than soap!’” He pauses before his next sentence. “And he had a point.”
“The smart part of my brain wasn’t there to tell me I was being a fuckhead. The smart part of my brain was also drunk and sat in that meeting. He was just sat there like ‘That is a fucking excellent idea. Chivalry is not dead.”
“So, having consulted both of my brain cells, we decided to go ahead with the endeavour. I thought, the best way to do it is-” He begins to mime once more, but seems to decide that further explanation is necessary. “I can’t just free pour, I’m not made of money. The best way, economically, was to- you know, like aftershave.” Conor then places the microphone between his legs, clearly a stand in for the body part in question, and shakes an imaginary bottle into his hands before rubbing them together and tapping them into the microphone. Looking straight out into the audience, he then reaches a hand behind himself and taps there. “You never know,” he says before pausing to let the audience react, “If your girlfriend laughed at that joke, you’re a lucky man.”
“There are only two things I’d not really thought of, only two, you’d be surprised to hear. The first was that, well, the, uh, the sensations. It was like, burn-y and cold at the same time. I don’t know if you’ve ever fucked a microwave in a blizzard, but it’s unusual.” He giggles slightly at his own joke, crinkles forming at the corners of his eyes.
“The other thing my tiny little man brain had not thought through was that, well, she was going to notice, because that’s not what penis’ taste like. Like, she wasn’t going to get down there and be like ‘Oh, oh no, a mint one, of course, yay! Oh, I love when this happens! In school, we’re taught that one in ten men have a minty dick. I thought that was just an expression, but here he is, lord of the mint cock.’ She didn’t say anything though, bless her cotton socks.” Remus chooses now to check his phone, finding that it’s about time to start moving towards the stage before he’s called onto it. He weaves through the tables and around the side of the stage, still listening to the end of Conor’s set.
“Well, there was one point during the,” Conor begins to make noises again, “the, uh, the blowjizzle . Like thirty seconds in she kind of just went-” Remus doesn’t see the action Conor makes to demonstrate as he moves towards the right side of the stage, just out of view, but it doesn’t take much imagination.
“Better than the alternative,” Conor continues, “a penis flavoured penis.” The audience laugh and Conor turns to look at Remus, and then back to the audience. “Anyway, on to our first act proper. Unlike my dick - clean because I covered it in mouthwash again just moments before I walked on stage - Remus lupin is one dirty bastard!” Remus grins as he steps out onto the stage to scattered applause, taking the microphone from Conor.
When Remus Lupin walks onto the stage, Sirius almost has an aneurysm. He’s tall and his hair is golden under the lights and the way his hand wraps around the microphone makes Sirius want to shout obscenities from his seat. When he opens his mouth to speak, Sirius narrows his eyes, daring whatever deity brought this man within ten feet of him to make him any more perfect because, damnit, he’s Welsh.
“I’m just looking into the crowd to see if there are any kids, ” Remus opens with his dumb accent, “No, I’m not a pedophile.” He pauses as the audience laughs. “It’s just, sometimes kids come to this kind of thing with their parents. I just think, you know, it’s late, Conor’s routine wasn’t exactly kid friendly, there shouldn’t be any kids in here.” He nods to the audience as if he’s asking for their agreement, but continues immediately. “Now, I’m not a parent, but I do like speaking on behalf of people, because I’m a white, cisgender male, and that’s what my people do.” Sirius would like to think that ‘heterosexual’ was purposefully omitted, but he can’t be sure.
“I imagine Christmas morning as a parent is very difficult, especially if you have young children. It’s Christmas morning, it’s 7am – I know, that time exists! Wild.” Remus Lupin definitely looks like the kind of person who is nocturnal and spends the nights getting alcohol poisoning, lung cancer and STDs. “They burst out of their rooms, they run downstairs. They’re so happy. They’re so filled with joy. It’s Christmas day! It’s the most magical day of the year. To them, magic literally happened overnight. They wished for shit, shits there.” He turns to the audience, holding his arms out, as though bewildered. “What the fuck? That’s insane. I’m 7 years old, but I’m pretty sure that tree shits presents.” He points to an imaginary tree and Sirius’ eyes linger on his hand and outstretched arm.
“But, as a parent you know, the time, the money, the organisation, the stress that’s gone into making this moment so special. But, when you see that smile on their stupid fucking face, it makes it all worth it. Then, they look at you with those big blue eyes that you hope resemble yours, and who do they thank?” He pauses for a second. “Santa. Thank you, Santa for these presents. Mummy and daddy, isn’t Santa amazing?”
“And, as a parent not wanting to shatter your child’s imagination, you must have to stand there, like, ‘Yeah, yeah, he worked really hard this year, didn’t he? The fat fuck. You know that disappointment that parents feel in that moment? That is exactly how doctors feel whenever you thank God.” Remus’ face adopts a little satisfied smirk at the reaction from the audience, which is one of both laughter and noises of surprise at ‘terrible blasphemy’ he’s just committed. Sirius knows that his parents would not condone this kind of humour and, honestly, that just makes Remus hotter.
“Mr Darcy, we are delighted to announce that your cancer has gone into remission,” Remus says in a softer voice, looking into his palm as though he’s reading, playing the part of a doctor.
“Oh my god, this is wonderful news,” he replies to himself, faking some tears.
“I know. It’s been a long, hard journey, but we got there in the end and we all couldn’t, couldn’t be happier for you.”
“Thank the Lord,” Remus says with a voice full of emotion before immediately returning to a deadpan expression.
“What? No, sorry. It’s just funny. I just couldn’t see his name anywhere on this fucking chart.” He waves his hand in the direction of the audience, using it as a prop chart. “I can see my name right at the top there, ’Doctor Michaels’, sat with you through two and a half weeks of chemotherapy. You’re welcome, by the way. ‘Doctor Connors’, her name’s there. She spent 6 hours cutting a tumour out of your fucking lung. I’ve got the names of all the nurses and all the radiologists here, can’t seem to find the Lord’s name anywhere on it. I’ll tell you what, maybe in my haste to give you the good news, maybe I skimmed past it, I’ll have another- I’ll have another look.” He says, louder at the end as if he’s talking over someone. Remus spends the next thirty seconds flipping the imaginary pages of his hand/chart, scanning it intently. “Ah, look at that. No God.”
“Yes, but the Lord sent you.” He counters to himself, pressing his hands together in mock prayer.
“I don’t think he did. He certainly didn’t chip in for that medical degree. If I remember correctly: you came to me, I diagnosed you and I specified the treatment. In fact, if I cast my mind even further back. He’s the one that gave you cancer.” Remus ends his sentence slowly, looking up from his hand and into the crowd with a smile spreading across his face. “Why?” he finishes, “Maybe because you’re an ungrateful cunt.” The crowd laughs and Remus takes this opportunity to untangle the wire that leads to the microphone where it lies on the floor so that he can move a bit more freely.
“I did this joke to a crowd apparently more religious than yourselves, some people walked out,” he begins, no longer playing a character, but just sounding stupid and Welsh and like he just smoked 20 cigarettes and Sirius thinks of what Remus’ voice would sound like if it was a whisper in his ear. “I’m not proud of it,” he continues. “Actually, let me clarify, I’m not proud of the reaction. I’m very proud of the joke, it’s fucking excellent. I did it along with a bunch of pedophile jokes, which have since been taken out, but they didn’t have a problem with that. Then again, we all know how easily the catholics forgive pedophilia.”
Remus thanks the crowd and walks off the stage, but Sirius isn’t paying attention to what he’s saying, just the way his mouth moves and the way he pushes his hair away from his forehead and grabs a bottle of water from someone just out of view. It takes Conor saying his name for him to remember that this is his introduction, and he should probably be on stage an about 3 seconds. As Sirius trips up the steps to the stage, he spots Remus chatting to one of the sound girls, his hand touching her shoulder.
“Hi,” Sirius lets out, not entirely sure where he’s going with this, “Good set.”
“Oh,” Remus says, turning around to face Sirius, “thank you!” Sirius thinks his voice is far too cheerful for his sense of humour and overall demeanor, but he’s late and doesn’t have time to question it. He just points to the stage and Remus nods, flashing him a smile.
“Good luck,” Remus calls after him as he steps into the view of the audience.
Sirius stumbles onto the stage, very aware that he’s still got his eye on Remus even as he makes his way onto the stage.
“Get a load of that guy! Fucking tall, Welsh, huge hands, anyone else thinking about how gladly they’d let him absolutely wreck them?” Sirius asks the crowd, pulling the mic off of the stand, weighing it in his hand. He flashes the crowd a dazzling smile, figuring that at this point, Remus is very likely somewhere in the crowd. “Hi, I’m Sirius Black.”