Chapter Text
“If we continue to expand upon where Hamilton was taking Euler’s principles and apply them to the equations of motion…”
Remus used the sleeve of his jacket to erase half of the equation he'd just scribbled across the blackboard, then quickly filled it in again, adding a D variable for duration.
“…adding in that fourth dimension of time…”
His tweed suit used to be a rich chestnut brown, but years of exposure to chalk dust had faded it to a pallid beige.
“…we can start to see how close we are to discovering something as seemingly impossible as movement through time.”
“Sir?”
Remus turned around. Of the twenty-four students in his class, about a third were taking notes, and half seemed to be casually listening. A few had completely checked out, which was fine. Remus had, once again, strayed quite far from the set curriculum.
One hand was raised lazily in the air.
Remus nodded to the boy. “Mr. Thomas?”
“So, with what you're proposing, Seamus here–” He clapped a hand on the shoulder of the boy next to him. “–could go back to this morning and stop himself from getting humiliated in Latin by Daphne Greengrass?”
Light giggles peppered the classroom.
Remus chuckled. “I find myself less compelled by your question than by your phrasing, Mr. Thomas. Did this humiliation occur in Latin class or did the young lady skillfully insult Mr. Finnegan in one of our oldest known languages?”
“Both!” Mr. Thomas shouted as Seamus Finnegan dropped his face into his hands and the giggles erupted into full blown laughter.
One student in the front row was not laughing. Her hand shot straight into the air.
“Yes, Miss Granger?”
“Professor, if Seamus were to figure out how to travel through time and stop his past self from being called a mentula parva by the prettiest girl in our class–”
“Do you have to humiliate my present self, too?” Mr. Finnegan moaned, to further giggles from the room.
“–wouldn’t there be consequences?”
“Ah, well considered, Miss Granger,” said Remus. He moved away from the chalkboard to lean on the front of his desk. “I imagine there would be. We wouldn't be having this conversation, for one. And perhaps that would be all, and the rest of the day would proceed as if nothing had changed. Or, perhaps, there could be a sort of… ripple effect, and by changing one simple interaction, Mr. Finnegan could set in motion a completely new version of the future which would otherwise have been impossible. Even, for instance, a future in which Miss Greengrass becomes Mrs. Finnegan and we're cursed with a whole gaggle of Greengrass-Finnegans."
"Hey!"
The class’s laughter at Mr. Finnegan’s expense was interrupted by the bell, which startled Remus so much he flung his chalk about two feet in the air. Time flies when you're discussing the infinite possibilities of modern science.
Remus rushed to gather up the books and papers that were scattered across his desk. Normally he would take his time, consider the equations he'd written on the board, answer any students’ lingering questions. But tonight, he had plans.
“Keep reading Joule!” he shouted as his students flew past him and out of the room. “We’ll get back on topic next class. And happy Halloween!”
Miss Granger’s hand shot up again. “Sir–”
“No, none of this will be on the exam,” Remus said, shoving his books into his satchel.
Satisfied, Miss Granger lowered her hand and packed up her own books.
Remus made it out of the classroom and was beelining for the exit when a button-nosed girl he recognized as the dean’s student assistant stepped between him and his plans.
“Dr. Lupin,” the girl said, “the dean would like to see you.”
Remus sighed. He hoped today’s tongue-lashing wouldn’t take too long.
He followed the girl to the administration hall, and through the dean’s garishly decorated office to the courtyard.
Dean Dolores Umbridge sat straight-backed on a stone bench, her frilly lace collar like a brace around her neck, her dress and jacket a blinding shade of pink, despite the fact that it was the dead of autumn. She was flicking spoonfuls of fragrant tuna to her prize-winning colony of mewling, squawking cats.
“Watch your step," she said with a saccharine giggle. "My felines have polluted the yard."
Remus didn't bother moving any closer. He wanted this meeting to be as quick as possible, and the last thing he needed was shit on his shoes.
“I received the most extraordinary letter last week from a parent,” Umbridge said in her grating, sing-song voice. “We are always pleased to receive letters from parents. They are our employers, after all.” She didn't bother to look up at Remus as she continued flinging canned fish to her cats. “This gentleman's son is in your class, Dr. Lupin.”
“I see.”
Remus knew exactly where this was going, and he wished she would just get to the point. But that was never her way.
“As I recall the syllabus,” Umbridge warbled, “the name of your tutorial is ‘Applied Mathematics and Engineering,’ am I correct?”
“Exactly correct, ma'am.” Remus spoke faster than normal to make up the time she was wasting.
Umbridge gave Remus her too-sweet smile that never reached her eyes. “Just as I thought. Surely it's all been a terrible mistake. Mr. Malfoy actually suggested that your first year course in applied mathematics has somehow become a seminar on theoretical physics! Ha!” She actually said ha. “But I know that none of my faculty would ever deviate from the assigned curriculum.”
She obviously already knew that Remus had deviated, and continued to deviate. Why did she have to play these infuriating games? The clock was ticking!
“Ma'am, with all due respect–”
“Hem-hem!” Umbridge cleared her throat pointedly, surely knowing that Remus meant no respect at all.
“That curriculum is forty years out of date,” he continued. “The students today are looking towards the new century. They want to be challenged and inspired, not spoon-fed dusty old equations that have been proved a thousand times!" He knew he shouldn't raise his voice, but he couldn't help it! "My students are the future of scientific innovation. It's my job to nurture—”
"What are these animals, Dr. Lupin?" Umbridge interrupted, holding out her silver spoon for one particularly fluffy white cat to lick.
Remus clamped his mouth shut and said through gritted teeth, “Your cats, ma'am.”
He tried not to grimace as one of them rubbed up against his leg.
“No, Dr. Lupin,” Umbridge said. “They are not just cats. They are science. Perhaps they aren't inspiring to you. Perhaps they don't challenge you–”
“No, ma'am.”
“Hem-HEM!”
Umbridge glared at him until he lowered his chin in apology.
“Animal husbandry is science, Dr. Lupin. I have been breeding these felines for twenty-five years. I have filled a library with information on their feeding patterns, social behavior, and breeding. Empirical, exacting, quantifiable records outlining the path to perfection.”
Remus bit back a laugh. He was no stranger to empirical data, exacting records, or the soul-draining amount of time and dedication it took to get results.
“Ma’am–”
Umbridge’s voice went low and cold as she dropped her sweet facade. “Duration is not a dimension. Scientists do not imagine the world around them. They do not wool-gather or cloud-spin. They prove. They demonstrate.”
Remus wanted to remind her that without imagination there would be no telephone, no moving pictures, no electricity. But this time, he held his tongue.
“We have a way of doing things here. Radical theorizing is not acceptable.” She bared her teeth again and returned to her usual cloying tone. “Have I made myself understood?”
Remus sighed. “Yes, ma’am.”
“Very good. Now, you’re upsetting my kitties. Please go.”
Head buzzing with everything he wished he could say, Remus pivoted on the spot and strode back inside. As soon as he was out of Umbridge’s sight, he ran as fast as his arthritic legs would take him.
—
“You're late.”
Mrs. Pomfrey, Remus's housekeeper and de facto nurse, was waiting for him in the foyer when he burst through the front door, sweating and shaking.
“Umbridge,” he panted.
“That cow.” Mrs. Pomfrey scowled as she took Remus’s jacket. Remus made a dash for the stairs but she grabbed his arm. “Take a deep breath, love.”
He stopped. Inhaled. Exhaled. Tried to let go.
“It's going to be alright,” Mrs. Pomfrey said. She loosened her grasp and tapped his arm affectionately, releasing a white puff of chalk dust from his shirtsleeve. She tutted. “Now get yourself cleaned up.”
Remus took the quickest bath of his life, but was slow and careful shaving the stubble from his chin. He combed his moustache and thinning hair, then dressed in his nice, chalk-free, herringbone suit and chocolate brown homburg hat.
He had seen Sirius Black almost every day for the past eighteen months, ever since Sirius had become the patron of his research. But this time was different. This time, he was putting everything on the line.
This time, if Remus wasn't careful, could be the last.
“Very handsome,” Mrs. Pomfrey said with a grin when Remus reached the bottom of the stairs. She held out her palm, and Remus took from it the small velvet box he'd had her pick up that morning.
“Thank you,” he said, tucking the box into his breast pocket. “I know it's odd… a man giving another man a ring. But– but Sirius likes them! And–”
“Have I said anything?” Mrs. Pomfrey asked, raising a brow.
Remus caught his breath.
“No.”
She patted him gently on the cheek. “Everything's going to be fine. Now go. You're late!”
“Alright, alright!”
Remus went for the door, but stopped in his tracks when the drawing room caught the corner of his eye. He surveyed the clutter – the test tubes and beakers that covered every surface, the microscope and centrifuge, the notebooks and medical journals that were scattered across the piano – and he said a silent goodbye.
Because every last piece of it had been purchased with Sirius's money. And whether tonight went beautifully right and by some miracle Sirius felt the same, or if everything went horribly, tragically wrong and Sirius never wanted to speak to Remus again, Remus's work would come to an end. And he would have a normal drawing room again.
So he said a final farewell to his makeshift lab, to the questions that had consumed him all his life, and to the answers he would never find. And he stepped out into the crisp evening air.
—
The sun had set by the time Remus arrived at the park. He followed the yellow glow of gas lamps and jack-o’-lanterns, the mouth-watering smell of popcorn, and the steady stream of couples in their autumn finest to the bandstand, where an orchestra was halfway through “Funeral March of a Marionette.” A couple dozen long benches had been arranged around the bandstand and were filled with Halloween merrymakers.
He found Sirius leaning on a tree at the edge of the crowd, tossing popcorn into an unsuspecting lady’s hideous feathery hat.
In his perfectly tailored, mulberry-colored coat and matching top hat, without a single out-of-place hair in his beard or in the jet black waves that grazed his shoulders, Sirius was breathtaking. Although, he could have been wearing a potato sack and sitting in a mud puddle and he still would have taken Remus's breath away.
“Moony!” Sirius shouted when he spotted Remus. He startled the nearby merrymakers, and the woman in the ugly hat jumped a foot in the air, sending a cascade of popcorn tumbling out of her feathers.
It had taken Remus some time to warm up to his nickname, since he’d spent his entire life associating the moon with pain and suffering. But Sirius said it with so much affection, it eventually became Remus’s favorite word.
“Nice hat,” Sirius said with a twinkle in his eye when he’d made his way to Remus. “Who gave you that?”
“Someone with far too much confidence in my ability to pull it off,” said Remus with a self-conscious smirk.
“You do!” Sirius laughed, flicking the brim of Remus’s stylish hat.
Even once his laugh had petered out, Sirius kept smiling with that twinkle in his eye, and the warmth in Remus’s gut gave way to bubbling nerves. He felt the blood drain from his face. He was really going to do it.
Suddenly, he thought he might be sick.
“Popcorn?” Sirius tilted the fragrant paper bag towards Remus.
“N-no, thank you,” Remus stammered, pushing the bag away. “Not much of an appetite.”
“Are you feeling alright?” Concern darkened Sirius’s expression. “Isn’t it the new moon tonight? Thought you’d be jolly as a jay.”
“I am! I’m fine, I just…” Remus took a breath and composed himself. “I need to talk to you.”
“Well, that’s alright,” Sirius said, his smile returning. “It’s only me.”
Remus glanced around. There were at least a hundred people gathered at the bandstand, plus the orchestra, a dozen people queuing for popcorn and apples, and more still streaming into the park.
“Shall we walk?” Sirius asked, pocketing the popcorn bag and jerking his head in the direction of a path that disappeared into some tall, leafy trees. It was dark. Quiet.
Remus nodded.
“So, what is it?” Sirius asked when they’d put some distance between themselves and the crowd. “Is it your research? Have you had a breakthrough?”
“No.” Remus shook his head, sorry to disappoint Sirius yet again with a lack of results. “Well, yes, actually, I suppose I have had a sort of breakthrough. Just, not in the way you mean.”
They stepped into the safety of darkness. It was a beautiful spot – a circle of swaying trees protected them from all sides, and the twinkling lights from the bandstand and eerie melodies of the orchestra filtered through the leaves.
Remus stopped and turned to Sirius, who looked back at him expectantly with those warm, grey eyes. Remus's heart pounded out of his chest. There was no going back now.
“I can't take your money anymore,” he said.
Sirius’s face fell. “What?”
“It's been eighteen months since we started. Eighteen months of testing, and searching, and scouring the pages of medical journals. Countless hours in the lab, and I’m no closer to a cure than I was eighteen months ago.”
Remus was stalling. But he couldn't just come out and say I've fallen madly in love with you to his business partner. His best friend. Another man. If Sirius didn't feel the same way, their friendship would be ruined, or worse – he could have Remus arrested. Remus didn't really think Sirius would do that… but that didn’t make him any less terrified.
“These things take time,” Sirius said gently. “I know that.”
“And you’ve been so patient,” said Remus. “Too patient. Too accommodating.”
“I’ll keep being patient and accommodating until you find a cure,” Sirius insisted. “And after that, I’ll fund your next project. Researching… why pigs can’t fly,” he laughed, “or whatever suits your fancy.”
“No, Sirius, I can’t let you do that.” Remus sighed. “But it’s alright! I’m ready to give it up. It's time.”
“But, why?”
“I just think…” Remus took a deep breath. “It feels like an ethical problem, if I keep taking money from you.”
Remus let himself hope for just a moment that that would be enough of a clue for Sirius to catch his meaning. But, of course, it wasn’t, and Sirius just furrowed his brow in confusion. Remus had to stop stalling. He had to take the risk.
“Because I’ve come to think of you as more than a patron.”
Sirius could have pointed out the obviousness of that fact. They became friends so quickly after they met, their relationship was never strictly professional. Sirius could have said, Of course, old chum! and patted Remus on the shoulder.
But he didn’t. He gave Remus a small smile, the twinkle returning to his eye. He stepped a little closer. Close enough that Remus could smell the vanilla-scented oil in his beard.
It was quiet. The orchestra had stopped playing. And Remus could hear his own heartbeat.
He took off his hat, focused on the reflection of the bandstand lights in Sirius's eyes, took in a breath of vanilla, and said, “Much more.”
He felt like he'd stepped off a cliff. The only things keeping him from plummeting to his death were Sirius's growing smile and the ringed fingers that were slowly intertwining with his own.
“The feeling’s mutual,” Sirius said.
Remus exhaled and it came out as a little laugh. He’d stepped off the cliff and was walking on air!
Sirius was even closer now, and the buttons of their coats were brushing against each other. Remus glanced around. It was still quiet. They were still alone. So he leaned in, and kissed Sirius.
The intoxicating mix of vanilla, tobacco, and single malt Scotch whisky had Remus swooning, but still he kept the kiss light and careful. They were in public, after all. When he started wondering how the patch of hair under Sirius's lower lip might feel on his tongue, he pulled away.
The satisfied grin on Sirius's face made Remus let out another relieved chuckle.
He’d done it! He’d told Sirius how he felt, and Sirius felt the same! He wanted to dive right back in and kiss Sirius again in celebration. Then he remembered the ring.
“Oh, I have something for you!”
Sirius's eyes lit up even more when Remus pulled the little velvet box out of his breast pocket.
“It’s silly. You have so many already,” Remus said as Sirius took the box. “But I wanted you to have something from me.”
Sirius opened the box to reveal the silver ring, its small, blue stone surrounded by a delicate filigree of stars and moons. Sirius’s eyes softened and his smile fell. Cold panic coursed through Remus's veins. He knew he should have gotten a more expensive stone.
“It– it’s topaz,” Remus explained. “It’s–”
“My birthstone.” Sirius looked from the ring to Remus, and he was tearing up. Not disappointed, then.
Sirius replaced one of the rings he was wearing with the new one.
“I bought it with my university earnings,” Remus quickly added. “So you didn’t pay for your own gift.”
Sirius chuckled, admiring the ring on his finger. “It’s beautiful.”
There was a snap of a twig and a crunch of leaves. Remus whipped around, and his stomach sank. A man was stepping towards them from between the trees. He was short with long, matted ginger hair, a scraggly beard, and a disconcerting smirk on his face. How long had he been there? What had he seen?
“Walking through the dark on Halloween night?” the man said in a gravelly voice as he stalked closer. “You two must be brave. Or, maybe, up to something a little devilish?”
“We were just talking,” said Remus, his voice shaking. “Needed some quiet.”
“Don't worry, gentlemen. Your little secret’s safe with me.” The man sauntered closer, circling them. He reeked of stale breath and alcohol. “Only, I’ll be needing your money, now.” He pulled a revolver from under his coat.
Remus should have felt afraid – expected himself to be – staring down the barrel of a gun. But he wasn't. He was angry. He uncurled his fingers from the tight fists they'd made, fished out his pocket watch and his old (and rather empty) leather wallet, and slammed them into the man's grubby, outstretched palm. Sirius handed over his fuller, more expensive wallet.
“And your jewelry, too,” the man sneered.
With a scoff, Sirius removed his cuff links and shoved them into the man’s hand, then started pulling rings from his fingers. He dumped a handful of them into the man’s palm, then tucked his hands into his pockets as the thief looked over his loot.
The ring with the blue stone was noticeably missing.
“All of them,” the man growled, tossing the handful of rings into his pocket and jerking the revolver towards Sirius.
“He's given you plenty,” Remus spat.
“Afraid that’s not how this works. Come on, pretty boy, just give it–” The man lunged at Sirius, grabbing his wrist and yanking his hand out of his pocket.
In an instant, everything went wrong.
“Get your hands off of him!” Remus roared.
He grabbed the dirty thief by the lapels and tried to pry him off of Sirius.
There was a blinding flash of light and a sound like the world was exploding.
Sirius fell.
“Why did you do that?” the man cried. “Why did you make me do that?! It was only a ring!”
There were quick, crunching footsteps, then Remus and Sirius were alone again.
“Help!” Remus heard himself scream.
He was on the ground, and Sirius was lying in his arms.
“Anybody! Help!”
Something warm and wet was soaking through the front of Sirius's coat onto Remus’s hand.
“No… Sirius… Sirius…”
Remus kept saying his name, over and over, like that might keep him there until someone, anyone–
Please!
Remus held Sirius in his arms, stroked his cheek, and watched helplessly as his beautiful, warm grey eyes went cold.