![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bronze_ribbonsPart 1
Des couples qui se défont
(Of couples breaking up)
When Snape arrived at his office on Wednesday morning, he found a stack of 1980s-era CDs on his desk. He raised his eyebrows at Gooch, who had just bitten into a turnip cake.
Gooch gestured apologetically at his mouth, chewing and swallowing rapidly. When he was able to speak, he said, "Broadening your cultural horizons."
Snape peered at the CD on top. "What kind of group names themselves 'Air Supply'? Recovering tin-whistle players?"
Gooch grinned. "Be grateful you're getting only the mainstream discs." He pointed to his outbox, where he'd stacked several thick interdepartmental envelopes. "If you want soul-scarring cheesiness, you can't beat the Claudian Turtles."
"Who's getting those?"
"Diana's ex. They probably belonged to him in the first place, now that I think about it."
The Claudian Turtles . . . Snape's mind jerked backwards to a conversation about music he'd overheard years before, between Remus Lupin and Nymphadora Tonks. He'd never met Diana White, but he'd seen her photograph on Gooch's desk during happier times. If one were to subtract the glasses and change the hair from silver to brown -- or, Salazar help him, pink --
He tried to appear casual as he leaned in close enough to peer at the top packet. The words "J. Lupin, Romance Lang/Lit" were clearly legible in Gooch's neat handwriting.
He cleared his throat. "An ex-boyfriends' club?"
"Not exactly. Lupin wasn't exactly broken up about their breakup." There was a touch of sheepishness in Gooch's grimace. "Diana moved here a couple years before he did. He didn't seem surprised that she and I had, ah, become close. Even helped with our move, actually -- should've made him take his CDs then." He poked at the turnip cake with his chopsticks, sketching a sigil of sorts on its surface.
Snape said, "You don't seem overly traumatised yourself."
Gooch squeezed the ends of the chopsticks around another bite of cake. "Have a heart, Napier. Moping over women never brought them back."
"Nor does giving their things away. Aren't you moving a shade too fast here?"
The bite of cake fell onto Gooch's desk. He swore, flicked it into his wastebasket, and muttered a quick charm to erase the smear of grease it had left. "She won't be back," he said. "She left to move in with her new man. If I had to guess, she started up with him three months ago. All this --" he gestured to the CDs and the outbox -- "is the stuff she left behind. The stuff not important enough to take with her."
Snape tapped the jewel-case of the top CD. "Put that way . . . what makes you think I want your ex-girlfriend's leftovers?"
Gooch shrugged. "It's up to you. They're a gift, not an obligation." Snape frowned at the echo of Lupin's words. Gooch, in turn, bestowed upon Snape a look of genial exasperation. "Stop that. You're as bad as my mother's relatives. All that crap about who owes what to whom -- take the damn CDs and use them for coasters or target practice, or to scare crows away from the garbage. I swear you'll be doing me a favor."
Snape pushed the CDs to the side and pulled out his laptop. "Put that way . . ."
Gooch squinted at the remaining bits of turnip cake. "Amazing how much work it is, framing the problem properly . . ."
So what do I do about Remus Lupin? Aloud, Snape said, "I take it Jean will know what you're about?"
Gooch looked up. "You know Jean? Why haven't you -- oh, the French class! He's teaching it? What a waste." At Snape's look of enquiry, he explained, "If life were fair, Lupin would be tenured already. Massively popular with the students. His seminars on François Villon have waitlists. He doesn't publish, though. Chicago only hired him because they wanted to keep Di."
Which means . . . what? "So you think he'll be moving on?"
Gooch looked thoughtful. "Their breakup was years ago. Now that you mention it, it's weird he's still here -- but maybe he just likes the city." His eyes flickered over to the packets, and a hint of cynicism crept into his expression. "More likely, though, he just can't be bothered to move, until someone makes him. Which ties in to the not-publishing, too. He's definitely the passive type -- has to be pushed to care."
Gooch's smile was grim as he added, "It drove Diana nuts. She got tired of trying to make him say or take what he wanted."
It was all Snape could do not to roll his eyes. Instead, he fiddled with the paper hand-guard on his coffee cup, pretending only mild interest in Gooch's revelations. He tried to find something neutral to say, and settled upon, "I would think that hasn't been a problem for you."
Gooch's laugh was as bitter as his smile had been. "You'd think. I'm too damn Japanese for my own good, though. We hint and we strategize, but we don't come right out and ask. We want people to care enough to know what we want."
"So she left you because of that?"
Gooch tossed the cake container into the wastebasket. "No, she left because I haven't been around. Some things are just basic." He grimaced again. "It's for the best, though. I never did have time for her political work, and that's heated up this term."
He stood up and Summoned his backpack. "You're seeing Lupin tonight, yes?"
Snape merely nodded. He had dropped the class, but Gooch didn't need to know about his dinner plans.
Gooch nodded at the packets in his outbox. "You could take those with you, then? They'll get to him in better shape . . ." He smiled once more, his cheerful mask back in place. "Tell him he gets one 'I told you so.' Just one."
Ne plus penser à ça
(No longer thinking about that)
That night, Snape arrived at Lupin's office a few minutes after 7:30 p.m., having estimated that it would take Lupin at least five minutes to handle post-class questions. Lupin's office was three buildings away from the classroom; Snape had assumed he had Apparated between the two. When Lupin walked through a door at the end of the hallway -- sans overcoat, as he had the first night -- Snape realised that the four buildings were likely physically connected through hidden hallways or tunnels.
He was unreasonably annoyed with himself for not having deduced this earlier, and even more irked to see that Lupin was not alone: Read-Ahead Girl was with him, talking very rapidly in oddly urgent tones. When she caught sight of Snape, she looked every bit as vexed at his presence as he was by hers.
Lupin, in turn, seemed mildly amused, but he merely said, "Ah, Napier," and unlocked the door to his office. "Come on in, this will take just a minute." Snape almost laughed out loud at the look of chagrin on Read-Ahead's face. Wanted him to yourself, did you? You're going to have to try harder.
Lupin crouched down in front of a bookcase, restacking its front row of books to his left in order to access the back of the shelf. He pulled out two battered paperbacks and extended them to the messy-haired woman.
"These should do it," he said. "Let me know if you need more help."
"Merci beaucoup." Read-Ahead accepted the books, looking as though she was trying to think of something else to say.
"À bientôt, mademoiselle," Lupin said. His tone was kind but the note of dismissal was unmistakable.
"Bonne nuit, Professor." The woman scowled at Snape once more but took her leave. After her footsteps receded down the corridor, Lupin shut the door and leaned against it, sighing.
"You really shouldn't encourage them," Snape said.
"You really shouldn't think that's funny," Lupin retorted, but his lips were twitching. "This teaching is a very serious business."
Snape lightly tapped the stack of comic books on Lupin's desk. "A very serious business indeed."
Lupin feigned a look of outrage. "Heathen! Astêrix and Cleopatra is vital to the transmission of knowledge." His lips twisted. "Especially when most of the class resents having to be there in the first place."
"It gives you a job, Lupin."
"True, true." Lupin pushed himself away from the door and suddenly flung it open. Snape heard a squawk and then a yelp as Lupin hauled the messy-haired woman into the office and slammed the door.
For a moment, there was no sound except for the whirr of the heater and the wail of a siren in the distance. Then, in a very small voice, the woman began, "Sir --"
Lupin's voice was glacial. "If you can't eavesdrop any more competently than that, Enid, you need to retire."
Her chin lifted a notch. "I wasn't really trying, sir. I just wanted to know --"
"Enid." Lupin's voice had dropped another degree. "Have I not given you enough for what you need to know?"
Read-Ahead's expression remained defiant. "What's so wrong about wanting to know more?" She pointed to the school seal on one of Lupin's papers. "Crescat scientia vita --"
"Don't give me that," Lupin snarled, his face hard. "What you know can kill you. What others think you know can kill you, and other people, too. My bloody job is to keep you lot from getting yourselves killed any sooner than you'll manage it on your own."
Read-Ahead jerked her head towards Snape. "He one of us? At least tell me that, Jean. That's all I need to know."
Lupin didn't hesitate. "Yes," he snapped. "And that's more than you need to know. And more than he needed to know about you or me."
It was as if Lupin had flipped a light switch: Snape could see the instant Read-Ahead suddenly got the concept. "Hell," she said, contrite. "I do make your job harder, don't I? I'm sorry, Jean --"
Lupin folded his arms. "I don't want 'sorry,' Enid. I want you to do your job and to fucking stay alive. Not getting me killed would be a lovely bonus."
Read-Ahead held up her hands in a gesture of surrender. "Enough. No need to twist the knife -- I may be slow, but I'm not dense once I get it." She shoved the books that had tumbled out of her bag back into it, and then she looked at Snape.
"My apologies, sir," she said. "Being over-suspicious is my job, but that's no excuse." She looked at Lupin. "My sincere best wishes for a boring evening, Jean." Without waiting for his reply, she Apparated out.
Lupin remained where he stood, watching Snape warily. Snape let the silence between them thicken until the room felt clogged with it. Then he said, "If you're even thinking of telling me I don't need to know . . ."
Lupin shrugged and dropped into his desk chair, scrubbing at his face with his knuckles. He looked as though he had a headache the size of the Sears Tower. "Can't help what I think, I'm afraid. But I'll tell you what I can, if you insist."
When he didn't continue, Snape glared at him. "So help me Salazar --"
Lupin snorted. "Did you find him all that useful, last time around? 'Cause I sure could use all the help I can get." His eyes glittered as he added, "And before you start asking your questions, Napier, may I advise you to be absolutely clear on your boundaries? No matter what you've believed about me before, I don't actually want to hurt or use you."
Snape slowly said, "I take it that's a part of your real job?"
Lupin snapped a rubber band at a map of the Paris Metro mounted on the wall. "If you're enjoying your life as it is, Napier, you might consider holding your questions. Indefinitely. Read some Astérix instead, or Arsène Lupin, or -- hell, I've always thought you might like Villon." Lupin pushed himself out of his chair and leaned his head against one of the taller bookshelves.
Snape said, cautious, "Why are you attracted to him?"
Lupin looked sidewise at Snape and then reached up, pulling a grey-and-white paperback from an upper shelf. Its spine was labelled "François Villon, by D. B. Wyndham Lewis" in slanted type. Lupin thumbed it open to a middle section and read aloud:
Snape softly said, "You are overly enamoured of trouble, Lupin."
Lupin answered, "Not for its own sake, Napier." He shut the book and set it aside. "Villon also happens to write well." He stared out of the window as he recited a verse from memory:
He then turned to face Snape once more. "I die of thirst by the fountainside, / hot as fire and trembling to the teeth," he translated. "My own country's foreign to me, and by the fire, I'm shivering."
After a moment, Snape said, "You're right, I do like it. But I also think you're stalling."
Lupin shrugged and stood up. "Let's go get some food."
Snape remained seated. "Now I know you're stalling."
Lupin Summoned his coat. "It won't kill you to have some mezedes first." He paused. "That is, I'm assuming you're still interested in dinner."
"It's not a bad idea," Snape agreed. "Especially since I doubt your answers are short."
"I could make them short, but you wouldn't find them satisfactory," Lupin said.
"So, food first," Snape said. The act of lifting up his backpack reminded him of the favour Gooch had requested. He set the backpack down, pulled out the two packets, and placed them on Lupin's desk.
Lupin's eyes widened at the packets' size. "Going to make me sweat for that Wolfsbane, I see. Not that I mind at all," he added hastily.
"What? Oh. No, these are CDs. Gooch Smith sent them along."
Lupin blinked. "Gooch? Johann Noguchi Smith?"
It was Snape's turn to be startled. "Johann? I didn't know that. No wonder he uses only the 'J.'"
Lupin grinned. "Nope, no mystery there. His mother worshiped Bach on the wrong side of idolatry." His expression turned rueful as he regarded the packets. "No mystery here, either. I spotted Diana at the Medici last week, and she was having a very good time with her new man."
In spite of himself, Snape felt compelled to ask, "You see her often?"
Lupin said, "Only professionally. Count yourself lucky you work safely away from the quad -- she's ten times as lethal on a ten-speed. Every day I thank my stars she's stayed away from motorbikes." He opened the first packet and grimaced at its contents. "How's Herr Gooch doing?"
"He said you get one 'I-told-you-so,' but only one."
"Wouldn't dream of it," Lupin declared. "Glass broomsticks, as the saying goes." He unlocked his briefcase and put the packets inside. "Just tell me he's not playing Carla Bruni over and over, though. If he is, I'll feel morally obligated to swing by and kick his ass."
"I'll kick his arse myself if I need to," Snape said, deploying his poshest accent.
"I don't use silencing charms on this room," Lupin drawled. "Too suspicious. Best I can do is a Garbling spell, and it don't hide accents nohow."
"Stop that," Snape growled. "You're making my ears bleed."
"Can't be worse than maudlin melodies about roses and sorrowful secrets."
"He's spared me so far. Wonderful device, headphones." Snape allowed a gleam of pure evil to appear into his eyes. "I did catch him singing along to Judy Collins one afternoon, but I'm saving that for something blackmail-worthy."
"No ragging on Judy Collins," Lupin ordered, locking his briefcase. "I wore out my first copy of Wildflowers long ago."
Snape made a face. "Let me guess. 'Both Sides Now'?"
Lupin's response was almost a sneer. "Please. Give me some credit. I got sick of that song before the first War was over." Snape was surprised to see a hint of trepidation flicker across Lupin's features as he admitted, "I prefer 'Albatross.'"
He could look it up later, but as long as Lupin was talking . . . "I don't recall that one."
Lupin opened the door and gestured for Snape to step through. He doused the lights and locked up the office before he spoke again.
"Many people wander up the hills from all around you / Making up your memories and thinking they have found you."
Snape stopped at the water fountain to ease the sudden dryness in his throat. Even so, his voice sounded to his own ears like a croak when he turned again to Remus. "What do you want of me, Jean? What is this dinner really about?"
Lupin's voice was deliberately, maddeningly light. "It's about pastitsio and moussaka and bottles of Mythos. That's all it should be." He rested his hand on the push-bar of the building door. "If there's anything more to it, that's up to you to choose."
Snape heard the faint but unmistakable warning in the word choose. He said, "I'm going to tell Gooch he was right. You are the most passive-aggressive son of a --"
The foyer was so narrow that it took only one step for Lupin to crowd Snape against the wall. Lupin's breath was as warm as his eyes were icy.
"Écoutes-moi bien, Napier. This is a choice. I'm pretending as best I can that I don't care that I'm a danger to you."
"Remus Lupin was good at that," Snape hissed back. "What makes Jean Lu-pan different?"
Lupin leaned in even closer, so that he spoke against Snape's cheek. His voice was raw with regret and barely suppressed anguish. "Remus Lupin wanted his friends to stay his friends. Remus Lupin didn't have the guts or the wherewithal to stop other people from using you."
Snape scoffed, "As if it could have been all up to you, Lupin. You flatter yourself."
"No doubt." A flash of humour lit Lupin's eyes, but his voice remained urgent. "Severus. After all these years, the least I can do -- the least I must do -- is to keep giving you the choice to steer clear. I shouldn't even have suggested dinner." He stepped back, and Snape instinctively stepped forward, his body already protesting the loss of contact.
He placed his hand on top of Lupin's before the other man could push open the door. "Then, why did you?" he demanded.
"Because I'm bloody tired of buffalo-flavoured Wolfsbane."
Snape wrapped his fingers around Lupin's. "Try again. Why?"
It was mesmerising how swiftly Lupin's eyes flashed from ice to fire. "Sheer fucking curiosity. And I've actually missed the sound of your voice. It should go well with the beer."
Snape tightened his hold. "If you're lying, about this, I swear I'll hex your balls to Scotland and back."
Lupin pushed both their hands against the bar. "It's my job to tell lies, Napier," he said bluntly. "But you're not my job, and you won't be. Not unless you truly want to be back in harness."
The wind was still high and icy, and both men sucked in their breaths as its bitterness crashed against them in full force. Lupin shook his hand out of Snape's clasp, seized the loose ends of his scarf, and muttered, "Que les loups se vivent de vent . . ."
"What?" Snape demanded.
"Villon," Lupin said, rewrapping the muffler more securely around his neck. "This is 'a wind that feeds the wolves.'"
Quelque chose vient de tomber
(Something's just fallen)
They hurried across the street to the rear of the college bookstore, and Apparated from its deserted loading dock to the restaurant. They spent the subsequent hours talking about books and music and parks and funding. Between the stuffed squid and the lamb sweetbreads, Snape decided to heed Lupin's warning and save his questions for some other time. He was out of practice where such games were concerned, and he had little desire to spend more time with Read-Ahead Girl and her ilk unless he had no choice.
Choices. Lupin wanted to give him choices. That in itself offered so much possibility that Snape found the next several days impossibly short and full and dazzling as they flew past. On Friday, he emailed to Lupin some articles to be translated, and on Monday, they met again after class, discussing the translations and other matters over coffee and honey-drenched sweets at the Parthenon until 1 a.m. Too revved and caffeinated to sleep, they walked over to Buckingham Fountain, having argued over whether its bronze sea horses shared certain genetic endowments with mer-creatures they'd encountered in the past.
It being winter, the fountain was dry, save for a tiny puddle where someone had spilled a soft drink on its edge. Having satisfied himself that he had been right about seahorse musculature, Snape turned to Lupin, inexplicably seized with an urge to tease the other man. "The other night -- what was that poem? Dying of thirst by the fountainside?"
Lupin acknowledged Snape's smirk with a self-deprecating smile. "Nothing like well-aged self-pity, is there? Scïence tiens a soudain accident, / Je gaigne tout et demeure perdent."
When he didn't immediately translate, Snape demanded, "Share."
Lupin's rasp was nearly inaudible. "All my knowledge comes by accident. / Even when I win, I lose."
Snape didn't stop to analyse the sudden surge of fury Lupin's words provoked. Instead, he simply crushed his mouth against the other man's, trapping them both into a kiss so harsh and deep they were both gasping when they broke apart for air.
"Don't call this an accident," Snape ordered.
"D'accord," Lupin said, but his voice was laced with irony. "I'm glad you aren't worried about oncoming trains."
Snape nipped at Lupin's ear. "I'm giving myself a holiday in Ignorance. Its restaurants serve fantastic desserts."
Lupin ducked his head in response, his lips grazing Snape's jaw. "I've been there myself," he said. "Nice scenery."
Snape pushed his head forward, forcing Lupin to bring his head back up so that their eyes met. "Understand, Lupin. It's just a visit," he said.
Lupin nodded. "Understood." He looked as if he wanted to say more, but after a moment, he simply leaned into Snape for another hard kiss.
Tu comptes les chances qu'il te reste
(You count your remaining chances)
On Wednesday morning, Snape thought the city had never looked so beautiful. There was no wind, but the day was so clear and crisp that even the dingy warehouses on his route looked picture-postcard worthy. His experiments were humming along, and he was eager to commence his next tête-à-tête with Lupin. They hadn't gone further than the kissing on Monday, but it had been so intense in itself that Snape was glad they hadn't rushed ahead to the sex. Whenever they finally made love -- and Snape was already certain it would be a matter of when -- Snape wanted to it to be after the kissing had stopped being enough. For now, the kissing was so new and so all-devouring in itself that Snape found himself compulsively retracing its sensations every moment he could mentally steal away from his work. The feel of Lupin's mouth on his throat, the strength of Lupin's fingers twined with his . . . Snape couldn't remember the last time he had felt so alive.
Arriving at the lab, he poured himself a cup of coffee in the breakroom and carried it toward his office. When he pushed open the door, he was stunned by the wreckage that greeted him: Ripped-up papers. Broken pencils. A shattered ceramic mug. The overturned furniture. The clumps of rice and shreds of spinach scattered across the tiles.
And Gooch's body on the floor, his face bruised and his throat slashed.
This isn't real, Snape's mind protested. Researchers don't get killed in their offices.
Could've been a student. Maybe another vengeful clod he flunked?
Student, my arse. He wasn't ordinary. Neither are you.
Neither was his ex. Twenty Galleons says this has to do with her.
You're not being fair. Just because you don't like her . . .
". . . never did have time for her political work, and that's heated up this term."
If I were a hired assassin, would I believe that Gooch knew nothing? Would I care?
I don't want to care. It's not my job to care. It'snot my job to care that other people care.
You don't have a choice here. Your only choice is whether you're going to make it your choice.
As his mind zoomed between its questions and answers and guesses, Snape unconsciously crushed the paper cup in his fist, scalding himself with the hot liquid it had contained. His supervisor walked up as he hastily muttered an Evanesco.
The old man took in the scene within a single heartbeat. He said to Snape, "Go. I'll have to call the officials in a few minutes."
"I didn't do it," Snape choked out.
"Of course you didn't," the man said gruffly. "I don't hire imbeciles. Don't prove me wrong by just standing there."
He worked with Dr. Doren. Don't let them down now. With a glance of gratitude, Snape stepped behind the door and Apparated into Lupin's office.
Lupin turned from the window at the sound of Snape's arrival. His voice unnaturally calm, he observed, "You are out of practice. What if I had been in conference with a Muggle student?"
Snape sagged against the wall behind him, barely registering the presence of two other people seated in front of Lupin's desk. "So much for goddamned choices, Lupin. I can't not know, now. Did you know this would happen?"
"Did I know? No. Am I surprised? No." Lupin's face was bleak. "People get killed on my watch all the time, Napier. Even people who have nothing to do with my job." He turned to Read-Ahead Girl. "You may recall, Enid, how I told you what people think you know can kill you? This is a textbook case."
Before Enid could respond, the silver-haired woman next to her viciously kicked Lupin's desk and stood up. "So bloody clinical --"
"It's my job to be," Lupin repeated, exasperation leaking into his expression. "I'd ask what you want from me, but God knows I never could give it to you."
"No, you didn't," the woman said bitterly. "God knows I asked you often enough." She turned toward Snape, her jaw suddenly pure Black and her hair crimson. "'Napier,' now, is it? You look like hell, and you deserve each other. Come on, Enid." Nymphadora Tonks morphed back into Diana White and stalked out of the office.
Read-Ahead Girl hastily gathered up her belongings, but turned to Lupin before she left, confusion and desperation writ large across her face. At Lupin's nod of reassurance, she managed a trembling smile for both him and Snape before she scurried out.
Snape kicked the door shut and advanced toward Lupin. "I just found his body. When did you find out?"
Lupin pointed to a Wizarding photograph on his desk. "Rookwood's minions love to gloat. Diana received this an hour ago."
Snape forced himself to look at the photograph. Oh, Gooch . . . He tore his eyes away from the image of Gooch's contorted, terrified face and demanded, "The bint blames you?"
"She'll pull herself together," Lupin quietly said. "She has to yell at someone when shit like this goes down, and I can take it. Better than her wasting time blaming herself." Lupin's gaze had returned toward the quad outside his window, through which he could look down upon other students and professors travelling to and from their classrooms. "She tried so hard to keep him out of harm's way."
Snape inhaled sharply. "Even to the extent of leaving him?"
Lupin sighed. "I don't know if any of that was actual selflessness. She does want someone always there for her."
Snape sneered. "She'll never find that. No one can. It's not humanly possible."
"No," Lupin said, turning away from the window. "There's only knowing what you can bear, and bearing what you know."
Snape stepped toward Lupin, gripped his hands, and said, "I choose to know you. Do not decide for me how much I can bear."
Lupin shut his eyes for a long, heartstopping moment, as if Snape's declaration had been a last straw -- somehow a something too much for him to bear. But just as Snape was about to drop their hands, Lupin pulled him close. Their mouths met in a kiss as fiery as the ones they had shared by the fountain.
"D'accord," Lupin finally said. "So be it." Not letting go of Snape, he Transfigured his desk chair into a pouffe -- one just wide enough to accommodate two closely entwined men. As they sank down onto the cushion, Lupin aimed his wand at the map of the Metro and murmured, "Les oiseaux s'envolent." It shimmered into a map of Chicago's streets and tunnels, with numerous figure-specks scattered throughout its grids, some stationary and some moving.
"'The birds fly away,'" Lupin translated.
"Very romantic," Snape observed.
"I suppose. Not why I picked it. I wanted something not too long, not too close to a spell, and not so common someone would say it in here by accident."
"Not unlike a safeword," Snape murmured. He was amused both by the startled glance that Lupin shot him and the considering look that replaced it.
"Really? Well. We'll save that for later." Snape allowed himself a smirk as Lupin shifted against him, trying to get comfortable. Lupin brushed his lips against Snape's cheek and then said, "Any questions before I continue?"
"Just one," Snape said. "You say 'dah-core' a lot. What exactly does it mean?"
Lupin pressed another kiss against Snape's forehead. "It means, 'Okay.' Literally, it means 'of agreement.' De and accord contract to d'accord."
Snape couldn't resist another smirk. "Yes, Professor," he said, infusing his tone with mock docility.
Lupin flushed, but simply said, "There is so much I want -- need -- to share with you."
Snape brought Lupin's hand to his lips and pressed a kiss against the worn knuckles. "D'accord," he repeated, striving to emulate Lupin's pronunciation more precisely. "D'accord."
"D'accord," Lupin said. "Let us begin, then."
Des couples qui se défont
(Of couples breaking up)
When Snape arrived at his office on Wednesday morning, he found a stack of 1980s-era CDs on his desk. He raised his eyebrows at Gooch, who had just bitten into a turnip cake.
Gooch gestured apologetically at his mouth, chewing and swallowing rapidly. When he was able to speak, he said, "Broadening your cultural horizons."
Snape peered at the CD on top. "What kind of group names themselves 'Air Supply'? Recovering tin-whistle players?"
Gooch grinned. "Be grateful you're getting only the mainstream discs." He pointed to his outbox, where he'd stacked several thick interdepartmental envelopes. "If you want soul-scarring cheesiness, you can't beat the Claudian Turtles."
"Who's getting those?"
"Diana's ex. They probably belonged to him in the first place, now that I think about it."
The Claudian Turtles . . . Snape's mind jerked backwards to a conversation about music he'd overheard years before, between Remus Lupin and Nymphadora Tonks. He'd never met Diana White, but he'd seen her photograph on Gooch's desk during happier times. If one were to subtract the glasses and change the hair from silver to brown -- or, Salazar help him, pink --
He tried to appear casual as he leaned in close enough to peer at the top packet. The words "J. Lupin, Romance Lang/Lit" were clearly legible in Gooch's neat handwriting.
He cleared his throat. "An ex-boyfriends' club?"
"Not exactly. Lupin wasn't exactly broken up about their breakup." There was a touch of sheepishness in Gooch's grimace. "Diana moved here a couple years before he did. He didn't seem surprised that she and I had, ah, become close. Even helped with our move, actually -- should've made him take his CDs then." He poked at the turnip cake with his chopsticks, sketching a sigil of sorts on its surface.
Snape said, "You don't seem overly traumatised yourself."
Gooch squeezed the ends of the chopsticks around another bite of cake. "Have a heart, Napier. Moping over women never brought them back."
"Nor does giving their things away. Aren't you moving a shade too fast here?"
The bite of cake fell onto Gooch's desk. He swore, flicked it into his wastebasket, and muttered a quick charm to erase the smear of grease it had left. "She won't be back," he said. "She left to move in with her new man. If I had to guess, she started up with him three months ago. All this --" he gestured to the CDs and the outbox -- "is the stuff she left behind. The stuff not important enough to take with her."
Snape tapped the jewel-case of the top CD. "Put that way . . . what makes you think I want your ex-girlfriend's leftovers?"
Gooch shrugged. "It's up to you. They're a gift, not an obligation." Snape frowned at the echo of Lupin's words. Gooch, in turn, bestowed upon Snape a look of genial exasperation. "Stop that. You're as bad as my mother's relatives. All that crap about who owes what to whom -- take the damn CDs and use them for coasters or target practice, or to scare crows away from the garbage. I swear you'll be doing me a favor."
Snape pushed the CDs to the side and pulled out his laptop. "Put that way . . ."
Gooch squinted at the remaining bits of turnip cake. "Amazing how much work it is, framing the problem properly . . ."
So what do I do about Remus Lupin? Aloud, Snape said, "I take it Jean will know what you're about?"
Gooch looked up. "You know Jean? Why haven't you -- oh, the French class! He's teaching it? What a waste." At Snape's look of enquiry, he explained, "If life were fair, Lupin would be tenured already. Massively popular with the students. His seminars on François Villon have waitlists. He doesn't publish, though. Chicago only hired him because they wanted to keep Di."
Which means . . . what? "So you think he'll be moving on?"
Gooch looked thoughtful. "Their breakup was years ago. Now that you mention it, it's weird he's still here -- but maybe he just likes the city." His eyes flickered over to the packets, and a hint of cynicism crept into his expression. "More likely, though, he just can't be bothered to move, until someone makes him. Which ties in to the not-publishing, too. He's definitely the passive type -- has to be pushed to care."
Gooch's smile was grim as he added, "It drove Diana nuts. She got tired of trying to make him say or take what he wanted."
It was all Snape could do not to roll his eyes. Instead, he fiddled with the paper hand-guard on his coffee cup, pretending only mild interest in Gooch's revelations. He tried to find something neutral to say, and settled upon, "I would think that hasn't been a problem for you."
Gooch's laugh was as bitter as his smile had been. "You'd think. I'm too damn Japanese for my own good, though. We hint and we strategize, but we don't come right out and ask. We want people to care enough to know what we want."
"So she left you because of that?"
Gooch tossed the cake container into the wastebasket. "No, she left because I haven't been around. Some things are just basic." He grimaced again. "It's for the best, though. I never did have time for her political work, and that's heated up this term."
He stood up and Summoned his backpack. "You're seeing Lupin tonight, yes?"
Snape merely nodded. He had dropped the class, but Gooch didn't need to know about his dinner plans.
Gooch nodded at the packets in his outbox. "You could take those with you, then? They'll get to him in better shape . . ." He smiled once more, his cheerful mask back in place. "Tell him he gets one 'I told you so.' Just one."
Ne plus penser à ça
(No longer thinking about that)
That night, Snape arrived at Lupin's office a few minutes after 7:30 p.m., having estimated that it would take Lupin at least five minutes to handle post-class questions. Lupin's office was three buildings away from the classroom; Snape had assumed he had Apparated between the two. When Lupin walked through a door at the end of the hallway -- sans overcoat, as he had the first night -- Snape realised that the four buildings were likely physically connected through hidden hallways or tunnels.
He was unreasonably annoyed with himself for not having deduced this earlier, and even more irked to see that Lupin was not alone: Read-Ahead Girl was with him, talking very rapidly in oddly urgent tones. When she caught sight of Snape, she looked every bit as vexed at his presence as he was by hers.
Lupin, in turn, seemed mildly amused, but he merely said, "Ah, Napier," and unlocked the door to his office. "Come on in, this will take just a minute." Snape almost laughed out loud at the look of chagrin on Read-Ahead's face. Wanted him to yourself, did you? You're going to have to try harder.
Lupin crouched down in front of a bookcase, restacking its front row of books to his left in order to access the back of the shelf. He pulled out two battered paperbacks and extended them to the messy-haired woman.
"These should do it," he said. "Let me know if you need more help."
"Merci beaucoup." Read-Ahead accepted the books, looking as though she was trying to think of something else to say.
"À bientôt, mademoiselle," Lupin said. His tone was kind but the note of dismissal was unmistakable.
"Bonne nuit, Professor." The woman scowled at Snape once more but took her leave. After her footsteps receded down the corridor, Lupin shut the door and leaned against it, sighing.
"You really shouldn't encourage them," Snape said.
"You really shouldn't think that's funny," Lupin retorted, but his lips were twitching. "This teaching is a very serious business."
Snape lightly tapped the stack of comic books on Lupin's desk. "A very serious business indeed."
Lupin feigned a look of outrage. "Heathen! Astêrix and Cleopatra is vital to the transmission of knowledge." His lips twisted. "Especially when most of the class resents having to be there in the first place."
"It gives you a job, Lupin."
"True, true." Lupin pushed himself away from the door and suddenly flung it open. Snape heard a squawk and then a yelp as Lupin hauled the messy-haired woman into the office and slammed the door.
For a moment, there was no sound except for the whirr of the heater and the wail of a siren in the distance. Then, in a very small voice, the woman began, "Sir --"
Lupin's voice was glacial. "If you can't eavesdrop any more competently than that, Enid, you need to retire."
Her chin lifted a notch. "I wasn't really trying, sir. I just wanted to know --"
"Enid." Lupin's voice had dropped another degree. "Have I not given you enough for what you need to know?"
Read-Ahead's expression remained defiant. "What's so wrong about wanting to know more?" She pointed to the school seal on one of Lupin's papers. "Crescat scientia vita --"
"Don't give me that," Lupin snarled, his face hard. "What you know can kill you. What others think you know can kill you, and other people, too. My bloody job is to keep you lot from getting yourselves killed any sooner than you'll manage it on your own."
Read-Ahead jerked her head towards Snape. "He one of us? At least tell me that, Jean. That's all I need to know."
Lupin didn't hesitate. "Yes," he snapped. "And that's more than you need to know. And more than he needed to know about you or me."
It was as if Lupin had flipped a light switch: Snape could see the instant Read-Ahead suddenly got the concept. "Hell," she said, contrite. "I do make your job harder, don't I? I'm sorry, Jean --"
Lupin folded his arms. "I don't want 'sorry,' Enid. I want you to do your job and to fucking stay alive. Not getting me killed would be a lovely bonus."
Read-Ahead held up her hands in a gesture of surrender. "Enough. No need to twist the knife -- I may be slow, but I'm not dense once I get it." She shoved the books that had tumbled out of her bag back into it, and then she looked at Snape.
"My apologies, sir," she said. "Being over-suspicious is my job, but that's no excuse." She looked at Lupin. "My sincere best wishes for a boring evening, Jean." Without waiting for his reply, she Apparated out.
Lupin remained where he stood, watching Snape warily. Snape let the silence between them thicken until the room felt clogged with it. Then he said, "If you're even thinking of telling me I don't need to know . . ."
Lupin shrugged and dropped into his desk chair, scrubbing at his face with his knuckles. He looked as though he had a headache the size of the Sears Tower. "Can't help what I think, I'm afraid. But I'll tell you what I can, if you insist."
When he didn't continue, Snape glared at him. "So help me Salazar --"
Lupin snorted. "Did you find him all that useful, last time around? 'Cause I sure could use all the help I can get." His eyes glittered as he added, "And before you start asking your questions, Napier, may I advise you to be absolutely clear on your boundaries? No matter what you've believed about me before, I don't actually want to hurt or use you."
Snape slowly said, "I take it that's a part of your real job?"
Lupin snapped a rubber band at a map of the Paris Metro mounted on the wall. "If you're enjoying your life as it is, Napier, you might consider holding your questions. Indefinitely. Read some Astérix instead, or Arsène Lupin, or -- hell, I've always thought you might like Villon." Lupin pushed himself out of his chair and leaned his head against one of the taller bookshelves.
Snape said, cautious, "Why are you attracted to him?"
Lupin looked sidewise at Snape and then reached up, pulling a grey-and-white paperback from an upper shelf. Its spine was labelled "François Villon, by D. B. Wyndham Lewis" in slanted type. Lupin thumbed it open to a middle section and read aloud:
He was a very great sinner . . . During his hunted life he had twice, possibly three times, lain under sentence of death, had been half a dozen times punished by the Question, twice banished voluntarily, once by the State. He had committed homicide at twenty-four and burglary and sacrilege at twenty-five, and his unrecorded thefts, stabbings, cheats, and brawlings are probably innumerable. He was poor and stung by strong passions, and his miserable life alternated between the tavern, the brothel, and the prison. He was a very bad character indeed . . . In his nature the fine and the gross were inextricably mingled.
Snape softly said, "You are overly enamoured of trouble, Lupin."
Lupin answered, "Not for its own sake, Napier." He shut the book and set it aside. "Villon also happens to write well." He stared out of the window as he recited a verse from memory:
Je meurs de seuf auprés de la fontaine,
Chault comme feu et tremble dent a dent;
En mon païs suis en terre loingtaine;
Lez ung brasier frisonne tout ardent.
He then turned to face Snape once more. "I die of thirst by the fountainside, / hot as fire and trembling to the teeth," he translated. "My own country's foreign to me, and by the fire, I'm shivering."
After a moment, Snape said, "You're right, I do like it. But I also think you're stalling."
Lupin shrugged and stood up. "Let's go get some food."
Snape remained seated. "Now I know you're stalling."
Lupin Summoned his coat. "It won't kill you to have some mezedes first." He paused. "That is, I'm assuming you're still interested in dinner."
"It's not a bad idea," Snape agreed. "Especially since I doubt your answers are short."
"I could make them short, but you wouldn't find them satisfactory," Lupin said.
"So, food first," Snape said. The act of lifting up his backpack reminded him of the favour Gooch had requested. He set the backpack down, pulled out the two packets, and placed them on Lupin's desk.
Lupin's eyes widened at the packets' size. "Going to make me sweat for that Wolfsbane, I see. Not that I mind at all," he added hastily.
"What? Oh. No, these are CDs. Gooch Smith sent them along."
Lupin blinked. "Gooch? Johann Noguchi Smith?"
It was Snape's turn to be startled. "Johann? I didn't know that. No wonder he uses only the 'J.'"
Lupin grinned. "Nope, no mystery there. His mother worshiped Bach on the wrong side of idolatry." His expression turned rueful as he regarded the packets. "No mystery here, either. I spotted Diana at the Medici last week, and she was having a very good time with her new man."
In spite of himself, Snape felt compelled to ask, "You see her often?"
Lupin said, "Only professionally. Count yourself lucky you work safely away from the quad -- she's ten times as lethal on a ten-speed. Every day I thank my stars she's stayed away from motorbikes." He opened the first packet and grimaced at its contents. "How's Herr Gooch doing?"
"He said you get one 'I-told-you-so,' but only one."
"Wouldn't dream of it," Lupin declared. "Glass broomsticks, as the saying goes." He unlocked his briefcase and put the packets inside. "Just tell me he's not playing Carla Bruni over and over, though. If he is, I'll feel morally obligated to swing by and kick his ass."
"I'll kick his arse myself if I need to," Snape said, deploying his poshest accent.
"I don't use silencing charms on this room," Lupin drawled. "Too suspicious. Best I can do is a Garbling spell, and it don't hide accents nohow."
"Stop that," Snape growled. "You're making my ears bleed."
"Can't be worse than maudlin melodies about roses and sorrowful secrets."
"He's spared me so far. Wonderful device, headphones." Snape allowed a gleam of pure evil to appear into his eyes. "I did catch him singing along to Judy Collins one afternoon, but I'm saving that for something blackmail-worthy."
"No ragging on Judy Collins," Lupin ordered, locking his briefcase. "I wore out my first copy of Wildflowers long ago."
Snape made a face. "Let me guess. 'Both Sides Now'?"
Lupin's response was almost a sneer. "Please. Give me some credit. I got sick of that song before the first War was over." Snape was surprised to see a hint of trepidation flicker across Lupin's features as he admitted, "I prefer 'Albatross.'"
He could look it up later, but as long as Lupin was talking . . . "I don't recall that one."
Lupin opened the door and gestured for Snape to step through. He doused the lights and locked up the office before he spoke again.
"Many people wander up the hills from all around you / Making up your memories and thinking they have found you."
Snape stopped at the water fountain to ease the sudden dryness in his throat. Even so, his voice sounded to his own ears like a croak when he turned again to Remus. "What do you want of me, Jean? What is this dinner really about?"
Lupin's voice was deliberately, maddeningly light. "It's about pastitsio and moussaka and bottles of Mythos. That's all it should be." He rested his hand on the push-bar of the building door. "If there's anything more to it, that's up to you to choose."
Snape heard the faint but unmistakable warning in the word choose. He said, "I'm going to tell Gooch he was right. You are the most passive-aggressive son of a --"
The foyer was so narrow that it took only one step for Lupin to crowd Snape against the wall. Lupin's breath was as warm as his eyes were icy.
"Écoutes-moi bien, Napier. This is a choice. I'm pretending as best I can that I don't care that I'm a danger to you."
"Remus Lupin was good at that," Snape hissed back. "What makes Jean Lu-pan different?"
Lupin leaned in even closer, so that he spoke against Snape's cheek. His voice was raw with regret and barely suppressed anguish. "Remus Lupin wanted his friends to stay his friends. Remus Lupin didn't have the guts or the wherewithal to stop other people from using you."
Snape scoffed, "As if it could have been all up to you, Lupin. You flatter yourself."
"No doubt." A flash of humour lit Lupin's eyes, but his voice remained urgent. "Severus. After all these years, the least I can do -- the least I must do -- is to keep giving you the choice to steer clear. I shouldn't even have suggested dinner." He stepped back, and Snape instinctively stepped forward, his body already protesting the loss of contact.
He placed his hand on top of Lupin's before the other man could push open the door. "Then, why did you?" he demanded.
"Because I'm bloody tired of buffalo-flavoured Wolfsbane."
Snape wrapped his fingers around Lupin's. "Try again. Why?"
It was mesmerising how swiftly Lupin's eyes flashed from ice to fire. "Sheer fucking curiosity. And I've actually missed the sound of your voice. It should go well with the beer."
Snape tightened his hold. "If you're lying, about this, I swear I'll hex your balls to Scotland and back."
Lupin pushed both their hands against the bar. "It's my job to tell lies, Napier," he said bluntly. "But you're not my job, and you won't be. Not unless you truly want to be back in harness."
The wind was still high and icy, and both men sucked in their breaths as its bitterness crashed against them in full force. Lupin shook his hand out of Snape's clasp, seized the loose ends of his scarf, and muttered, "Que les loups se vivent de vent . . ."
"What?" Snape demanded.
"Villon," Lupin said, rewrapping the muffler more securely around his neck. "This is 'a wind that feeds the wolves.'"
Quelque chose vient de tomber
(Something's just fallen)
They hurried across the street to the rear of the college bookstore, and Apparated from its deserted loading dock to the restaurant. They spent the subsequent hours talking about books and music and parks and funding. Between the stuffed squid and the lamb sweetbreads, Snape decided to heed Lupin's warning and save his questions for some other time. He was out of practice where such games were concerned, and he had little desire to spend more time with Read-Ahead Girl and her ilk unless he had no choice.
Choices. Lupin wanted to give him choices. That in itself offered so much possibility that Snape found the next several days impossibly short and full and dazzling as they flew past. On Friday, he emailed to Lupin some articles to be translated, and on Monday, they met again after class, discussing the translations and other matters over coffee and honey-drenched sweets at the Parthenon until 1 a.m. Too revved and caffeinated to sleep, they walked over to Buckingham Fountain, having argued over whether its bronze sea horses shared certain genetic endowments with mer-creatures they'd encountered in the past.
It being winter, the fountain was dry, save for a tiny puddle where someone had spilled a soft drink on its edge. Having satisfied himself that he had been right about seahorse musculature, Snape turned to Lupin, inexplicably seized with an urge to tease the other man. "The other night -- what was that poem? Dying of thirst by the fountainside?"
Lupin acknowledged Snape's smirk with a self-deprecating smile. "Nothing like well-aged self-pity, is there? Scïence tiens a soudain accident, / Je gaigne tout et demeure perdent."
When he didn't immediately translate, Snape demanded, "Share."
Lupin's rasp was nearly inaudible. "All my knowledge comes by accident. / Even when I win, I lose."
Snape didn't stop to analyse the sudden surge of fury Lupin's words provoked. Instead, he simply crushed his mouth against the other man's, trapping them both into a kiss so harsh and deep they were both gasping when they broke apart for air.
"Don't call this an accident," Snape ordered.
"D'accord," Lupin said, but his voice was laced with irony. "I'm glad you aren't worried about oncoming trains."
Snape nipped at Lupin's ear. "I'm giving myself a holiday in Ignorance. Its restaurants serve fantastic desserts."
Lupin ducked his head in response, his lips grazing Snape's jaw. "I've been there myself," he said. "Nice scenery."
Snape pushed his head forward, forcing Lupin to bring his head back up so that their eyes met. "Understand, Lupin. It's just a visit," he said.
Lupin nodded. "Understood." He looked as if he wanted to say more, but after a moment, he simply leaned into Snape for another hard kiss.
Tu comptes les chances qu'il te reste
(You count your remaining chances)
On Wednesday morning, Snape thought the city had never looked so beautiful. There was no wind, but the day was so clear and crisp that even the dingy warehouses on his route looked picture-postcard worthy. His experiments were humming along, and he was eager to commence his next tête-à-tête with Lupin. They hadn't gone further than the kissing on Monday, but it had been so intense in itself that Snape was glad they hadn't rushed ahead to the sex. Whenever they finally made love -- and Snape was already certain it would be a matter of when -- Snape wanted to it to be after the kissing had stopped being enough. For now, the kissing was so new and so all-devouring in itself that Snape found himself compulsively retracing its sensations every moment he could mentally steal away from his work. The feel of Lupin's mouth on his throat, the strength of Lupin's fingers twined with his . . . Snape couldn't remember the last time he had felt so alive.
Arriving at the lab, he poured himself a cup of coffee in the breakroom and carried it toward his office. When he pushed open the door, he was stunned by the wreckage that greeted him: Ripped-up papers. Broken pencils. A shattered ceramic mug. The overturned furniture. The clumps of rice and shreds of spinach scattered across the tiles.
And Gooch's body on the floor, his face bruised and his throat slashed.
This isn't real, Snape's mind protested. Researchers don't get killed in their offices.
Could've been a student. Maybe another vengeful clod he flunked?
Student, my arse. He wasn't ordinary. Neither are you.
Neither was his ex. Twenty Galleons says this has to do with her.
You're not being fair. Just because you don't like her . . .
". . . never did have time for her political work, and that's heated up this term."
If I were a hired assassin, would I believe that Gooch knew nothing? Would I care?
I don't want to care. It's not my job to care. It'snot my job to care that other people care.
You don't have a choice here. Your only choice is whether you're going to make it your choice.
As his mind zoomed between its questions and answers and guesses, Snape unconsciously crushed the paper cup in his fist, scalding himself with the hot liquid it had contained. His supervisor walked up as he hastily muttered an Evanesco.
The old man took in the scene within a single heartbeat. He said to Snape, "Go. I'll have to call the officials in a few minutes."
"I didn't do it," Snape choked out.
"Of course you didn't," the man said gruffly. "I don't hire imbeciles. Don't prove me wrong by just standing there."
He worked with Dr. Doren. Don't let them down now. With a glance of gratitude, Snape stepped behind the door and Apparated into Lupin's office.
Lupin turned from the window at the sound of Snape's arrival. His voice unnaturally calm, he observed, "You are out of practice. What if I had been in conference with a Muggle student?"
Snape sagged against the wall behind him, barely registering the presence of two other people seated in front of Lupin's desk. "So much for goddamned choices, Lupin. I can't not know, now. Did you know this would happen?"
"Did I know? No. Am I surprised? No." Lupin's face was bleak. "People get killed on my watch all the time, Napier. Even people who have nothing to do with my job." He turned to Read-Ahead Girl. "You may recall, Enid, how I told you what people think you know can kill you? This is a textbook case."
Before Enid could respond, the silver-haired woman next to her viciously kicked Lupin's desk and stood up. "So bloody clinical --"
"It's my job to be," Lupin repeated, exasperation leaking into his expression. "I'd ask what you want from me, but God knows I never could give it to you."
"No, you didn't," the woman said bitterly. "God knows I asked you often enough." She turned toward Snape, her jaw suddenly pure Black and her hair crimson. "'Napier,' now, is it? You look like hell, and you deserve each other. Come on, Enid." Nymphadora Tonks morphed back into Diana White and stalked out of the office.
Read-Ahead Girl hastily gathered up her belongings, but turned to Lupin before she left, confusion and desperation writ large across her face. At Lupin's nod of reassurance, she managed a trembling smile for both him and Snape before she scurried out.
Snape kicked the door shut and advanced toward Lupin. "I just found his body. When did you find out?"
Lupin pointed to a Wizarding photograph on his desk. "Rookwood's minions love to gloat. Diana received this an hour ago."
Snape forced himself to look at the photograph. Oh, Gooch . . . He tore his eyes away from the image of Gooch's contorted, terrified face and demanded, "The bint blames you?"
"She'll pull herself together," Lupin quietly said. "She has to yell at someone when shit like this goes down, and I can take it. Better than her wasting time blaming herself." Lupin's gaze had returned toward the quad outside his window, through which he could look down upon other students and professors travelling to and from their classrooms. "She tried so hard to keep him out of harm's way."
Snape inhaled sharply. "Even to the extent of leaving him?"
Lupin sighed. "I don't know if any of that was actual selflessness. She does want someone always there for her."
Snape sneered. "She'll never find that. No one can. It's not humanly possible."
"No," Lupin said, turning away from the window. "There's only knowing what you can bear, and bearing what you know."
Snape stepped toward Lupin, gripped his hands, and said, "I choose to know you. Do not decide for me how much I can bear."
Lupin shut his eyes for a long, heartstopping moment, as if Snape's declaration had been a last straw -- somehow a something too much for him to bear. But just as Snape was about to drop their hands, Lupin pulled him close. Their mouths met in a kiss as fiery as the ones they had shared by the fountain.
"D'accord," Lupin finally said. "So be it." Not letting go of Snape, he Transfigured his desk chair into a pouffe -- one just wide enough to accommodate two closely entwined men. As they sank down onto the cushion, Lupin aimed his wand at the map of the Metro and murmured, "Les oiseaux s'envolent." It shimmered into a map of Chicago's streets and tunnels, with numerous figure-specks scattered throughout its grids, some stationary and some moving.
"'The birds fly away,'" Lupin translated.
"Very romantic," Snape observed.
"I suppose. Not why I picked it. I wanted something not too long, not too close to a spell, and not so common someone would say it in here by accident."
"Not unlike a safeword," Snape murmured. He was amused both by the startled glance that Lupin shot him and the considering look that replaced it.
"Really? Well. We'll save that for later." Snape allowed himself a smirk as Lupin shifted against him, trying to get comfortable. Lupin brushed his lips against Snape's cheek and then said, "Any questions before I continue?"
"Just one," Snape said. "You say 'dah-core' a lot. What exactly does it mean?"
Lupin pressed another kiss against Snape's forehead. "It means, 'Okay.' Literally, it means 'of agreement.' De and accord contract to d'accord."
Snape couldn't resist another smirk. "Yes, Professor," he said, infusing his tone with mock docility.
Lupin flushed, but simply said, "There is so much I want -- need -- to share with you."
Snape brought Lupin's hand to his lips and pressed a kiss against the worn knuckles. "D'accord," he repeated, striving to emulate Lupin's pronunciation more precisely. "D'accord."
"D'accord," Lupin said. "Let us begin, then."