i know you
Remus was wandering the candy aisle of his local supermarket when Lily called him. He had his headphones on and was listening to Sirius Black’s newest album. It had been on repeat since it came out, and God, was it good. He knew the words to every song by now, and he really owed Lily a big one because he would not have discovered this music had she not put him on it. Though it hadn’t helped him write particularly well, he had found something he was passionate about again. It had been a while since he felt that particular type of excitement–since he got the idea for his latest book, actually.
The phone rang in his pocket as he debated whether to get caramel milk chocolate or salted caramel dark chocolate. On one hand, he liked the salt and the bitterness of the dark chocolate, but he was more in the mood for something sweeter. He picked up the call from Lily without making a decision on the chocolate, but he continued staring at the two bags. Both were overpriced anyway.
“What’s up?” he asked, deciding he would just buy both.
Regulus had told him he was going to show up at Remus’ apartment around five in the evening, and it was already four-thirty. Regulus liked dark chocolate, and if he knew anything about his best friend, it was that Regulus Black hated James Potter for all he was worth, and there had been an official table read a few days ago. Remus and Regulus hadn’t had time to catch up over the days; well, Regulus hadn’t; Remus had been busy doing nothing, so he was sure he would hear about it over dinner.
“Remus, I have amazing news,” Lily answered, the excitement filling every crevice of her voice so well that he thought Lily might have won the lottery.
He began to walk toward the cashier. “What is it?” he asked, anxious to know what the news was.
With Lily, it would either be the best news of his life or she had gotten tickets to some bad reenactment of Shakespeare and wanted him to tag along. You never knew which one it would be, so you had to hedge your bets accordingly. One time seeing Shakespeare renacted for him was enough. Remus loved Shakespeare’s plays for what they were, but, man, college kids could ruin it for him so many times for one grade. He had witnessed it firsthand.
Lily cleared her throat as Remus approached the check-out line. “So you know how I met this guy named Peter? He’s making the music for Sealed With a Kiss.”
The line moved forward until there was only an old lady in front of Remus. “Yeah, I remember you telling me about him.”
“Okay, don’t freak out, but he’s produced a lot of songs with Sirius Black. They’re best friends, and I kind of went out for drinks with them yesterday.”
Now, that made Remus stop. Someone cleared their throat behind him, making him realize that it was his turn to pay. He loaded his chocolates and the other miscellaneous things he had picked up. “You met Sirius Black?” he breathed, not sure if he should feel ecstatic for Lily or jealous of her. He settled on doing both.
“And I got us two tickets for his tour. Clear your calendar for February 26th, Remus.”
“No fucking way,” he practically screamed. The cashier in front of him looked at him judgingly. The old lady, who had previously been walking away peacefully, was almost petrified. “I’m sorry,” he apologized to all of them, and then he paid for his groceries. He was walking out of the story as fast as he could when he spoke to Lily again. “Are you fucking kidding me? Because if you’re joking right now, Lily, I swear to God, I will come to your apartment–”
She laughed like she didn’t believe a word he said. “Nope, I’m not. He sent over the tickets just this morning. Front row, too.”
“Hold up, let me get this straight. In a single night, you met Sirius Black, got his fucking phone number, and managed to get two tickets to his show. God, you are unbelievable,” he laughed in pure astonishment.
Lily chuckled, and he heard something in her laugh, but he couldn’t quite decipher what it was. “You haven’t heard the best part,” she said, cruelly holding the truth away from him.
Someone passed by him, bumping into his shoulder as they passed. Remus fought the surge of anger it brought him. Some people could just be so disrespectful and inconsiderate, but he had been trying to give people the benefit of the doubt, so he assumed that they were in a hurry to save their dying mother.
“And that would be?” He reached the doors of his apartment building and walked through them. He was pretty confident that if he went up to the roof, he could make out the sign in front of the door to the grocery store. He had partially bought his apartment just because of how close it was to the store.
“You see, originally, I was only going to get one ticket for a reason I cannot tell you yet, but then Sirius, who’s really nice, by the way, nothing like most of those stuck-up celebrities. I’ve met a couple by this point, and I swear, the moment you’re not as famous as they are, they treat you like you’re–”
He got in the elevator and pushed the number seven, which would take him to his apartment. “Lily,” Remus interrupted.
“Right, yeah, he said he’d give me a second ticket as long as the person I brought along was you.” The elevator doors dinged, but Remus didn’t move.
“Sirius Black knows who I am?” he stuttered, forcing himself to take the necessary steps to his apartment’s doors. His hands shook as he tried to fit the key in the lock. “And he wants me at his show?”
Remus could hear Lily’s smile through the phone. “He knows quite a bit about you. He’s also a little obsessed with your books.”
He scoffed as he pushed open his door, finally having gotten his key in the lock. He kicked off his shoes and closed the door. “He obviously hasn’t read many good ones then.”
A bout of laughter came through the phone so hard that Remus had to pull it away from his ear slightly. He put it on speaker and placed his phone on the small table in the hallway as he began to take off his jacket. “I know you would say that. I literally told him you would say that,” she said in the middle of waves of laughter, pride managing to shine through all the same.
“What do you even wear to a Sirius Black concert?”
“I could always get you a t-shirt that says ‘Sirius Black Loves Me,’” she suggested, and Remus would have rather died than wear that shirt.
Remus moved into the kitchen to finish loading the dishwasher before Regulus came over. No matter how much time he spent with Regulus, and no matter how much Regulus loved him, he would always judge Remus for his dirty dishes. Regulus would never admit he loved Remus, but Remus knew it was true. That’s why they worked. Neither of them said the word ‘love,’ but they knew the other cared, and that was enough.
He was unpacking his grocery store plastic bag filled with chocolate when the door opened, and without hesitation, he knew that Regulus had walked through the door. Remus didn’t even bother to go to the door and greet him; he just grabbed a pair of scissors from the drawer and cut open the bag of chocolates. He was busy unwrapping one and popping it in his mouth when Regulus entered the kitchen, wearing Remus’ favorite dark blue sweater.
“You know, I’ve been looking for that for a week,” Remus said, gesturing to the sweater that was oversized on Regulus. Truly, he was drowning in it.
“I could have told you where it was,” Regulus replied simply, moving to grab a chocolate.
Just as suspected, he went for the dark chocolate, but Remus pulled it out of his reach before he could get it. “Are you going to give it back?” he asked, even though he already knew the answer and was fine with it. His first royalty check had gone to wool sweaters. He would soon need another closet just to hold them.
“No.” Regulus smiled, then moved as fast as a black cat and leaned down the counter to grab the bag of chocolates. “Thanks.”
Remus knew that the bag would probably be empty by the time Regulus left, but he had also planned for that. “No problem. I actually have something for you.”
Without another word, Remus walked out of the kitchen and to his bedroom. Regulus followed him faithfully, and once they were in the room, he practically leaped onto Remus’ unmade bed. He threw his phone next to his head on the dark brown duvet. Ignoring him, Remus moved to his closet to grab the t-shirt he had found while rummaging through his clothing for the sweater Regulus currently wore.
“So Lily got us these front-row tickets to this concert.” He paused as he made sure to grab the right shirt. Remus turned around to find Regulus moving to grab his lit-up phone. He threw the shirt at Regulus’ head. “It’s absolutely insane. Si–”
“What,” Regulus screamed at his phone, clutching it with a white-knuckled grip. The shirt Remus threw was hanging on one side of his face.
Instantly concerned, Remus strode to the bed. “What happened?”
Regulus generally kept his composure about most things. Sure, if you pissed him off or if he didn’t like you, you would know. But he was always cold. He would say what he wanted to, which was more often than not aimed to kill, but he didn’t show his emotions. Even around Remus, he was cold, except for the occasional break in armor. He kept it all bottled up until it came rushing out, and he could do nothing to stop it. But he was almost never angry. Remus had only really seen him be this angry because of…
“James Fucking Potter happened. Someone decided it was a brilliant idea to give my number to him,” he seethed.
Remus climbed onto the bed and grabbed the phone out of Regulus’ hands. He was concerned that Regulus would crack it in his grip and then Remus would have to deal with Regulus complaining about his broken phone. “What’d he say?” Remus read the message, then looked back up at Regulus with annoyed disbelief. “He literally just said hi and that it’s him.”
“But now he has my number,” Regulus argued, sitting back up on the bed.
“Well, what are you going to respond with?” Remus asked, not quite knowing why Regulus hated James Potter this much.
“I wasn’t going to answer with anything,” he admitted, though he was fully confident in his choice.
Remus recalled every time Regulus hadn’t responded to his text messages. If he wanted an answer out of Regulus, it would be over the phone or in person. “Man, you are a bad texter,” he laughed.
“No, I’m not,” Regulus claimed defensively.
With a knowing look on his face, Remus pulled out his own phone and, within a few seconds, had his and Regulus’ text message chain open. He faced the phone toward Regulus and scrolled through the endless stream of blue, with one or two grey messages scattered throughout. Remus raised his eyebrows, ready for a concession he knew he wasn’t going to get.
Regulus sighed, defeated, and pulled his phone from Remus’ grasp. “Fine, what do I say, then?”
“You could always say ‘thanks’ or ‘okay.’ It doesn’t have to be much,” Remus suggested, though he knew that he had been told that he was a considerably bad texter as well.
Regulus seemed to ponder it for a moment, then shook his head. “I think I’ll just leave him on delivered. He isn’t significant enough for a response.” He turned the phone off and onto the other side of the bed.
“He’s your costar. You realize that, right? Pretty significant.”
“I don’t have to acknowledge that until we start filming,” Regulus said, falling back against the bed.
Remus looked down at him fondly. “Which is…?”
“Tomorrow. We had an official table read a couple of days ago. If he doesn’t know his lines by tomorrow, I swear I might kill him,” Regulus threatened, and it was in no way–shape or form–empty.
“I’m sure you would,” Remus laughed and just left it at that.
He considered bringing the concert tickets back up, but he was hesitant. As good as Regulus was at acting like he was fine, Remus had known him for long enough to know he acted off whenever Sirius Black was mentioned. Remus had once asked about the rumors that Regulus and Sirius were related. Once the article had come across his eyes, the pieces clicked into place, but Regulus had denied it, as he had in interviews, so Remus believed it.
But he knew there was something underlying that had happened between them. Perhaps they weren’t related, but they had to know each other. Still, he couldn’t ask about it because he knew exactly how that would go. Regulus would shut down completely and wouldn’t tell him anything. With all that was going on with James, Remus didn’t think Regulus would appreciate the mention of Sirius Black. Besides, Regulus would have to learn to deal with James. His career was on the line, and solely because of that, Regulus would learn to at least look like he tolerated James. Remus had never seen Regulus feel this type of hatred for someone, but if he had to guess, it wouldn’t go away easily, and it wouldn’t go away soon.