Limitless

Taking It Slowly

Sirius, Fabian and I managed to clear out what was left in my tiny apartment the next day. All I really had were some muggle records and a muggle record player but we placed the other items of furniture in Headquarters replacing some of the older, shabbier pieces. Fabian and Sirius's hostility had not abated. They seemed to be taking shots at each other at every available opportunity. From what I could gather, there had been something of a scuffle after they apparated from my apartment the previous day. However, exactly what had happened was between them stayed between them. I was dying to find out but I didn't want to ask in front of Fabian. He continued to glare at me whenever we were in the same room. I couldn't read him at all. He just seemed furious all the time, unless he was smiling his particularly handsome smirk, which apparently drove Sirius into another tirade of mumbled insults. Not that they seemed to impact Fabian in the slightest. Sirius seemed to be taking advantage of the situation by making me work myself into near exhaustion.

Mrs. Bevan's body had been removed and the unit cordoned off by the muggle police. I tried not to think too hard about what had happened the previous evening. My chest continued to feel tighter than it should have.Even though there was no pain, I could almost sense it on the periphery. I couldn't even allow myself to mourn her because the fury overwhelmed me at the mere thought. I couldn't let it interfere with everything I had to do. As it was, I felt like I was balancing too many things at once.

If it was just a mission, that would have been no problem, but the emotional aspect of it all... I just felt completely overwhelmed.

That evening we set up the record player in our room. It was actually a moment for us to spend some time alone. Sirius sat on the floor bewitching the muggle record player to play without electricity while I was packing the records away.

"Alright," he said after about an hour of fiddling, consternation plain on his face, "Put one on and let's see if I got it to work."

I pulled out Rumours by Fleetwood Mac, put it in the player and set the needle. Sirius tapped the record player once and it began spinning, the familiar scratch of vinyl began before the music started to issue softly into the room.

"I love muggle music." He said smiling broadly.

"Me too." I said watching him with satisfaction. "I wasn't sure you would know any though...""Oh yeah... after my mother kicked me out I moved into the Potters place. They were great about it, treating me like another son. They let me stay with them when I wasn't at Hogwarts, took me on holiday with them, you know, family stuff. But then I got an inheritance from my uncle who was a little more sympathetic to me than my parents were. He gave me some money so I moved out of the Potters place, I didn't want to burden them anymore, I mean, not that I was burdening them, or they made me feel that way, but I felt that I was..." he said looking a little bit ashamed.

"I understand." I said and I did actually understand. If Dumbledore hadn't got me started after Hogwarts I would have had no one to rely on. And as it stood, I hated relying on anyone for anything at all.

"So I moved into a little place of my own in London. I bought a muggle motorbike and bewitched it to fly and I used to go to bars in the evenings just to be around some people," he said looking a bit sad, "but the music was always the best part about it. I just used to sit there listening." He ended with a small smile.

"I did the same thing but I can't imagine that you were ever short of company." I added with my own small smile.

"Why?" He asked looking a little puzzled.

"Because you're hot." I said simply, "I'm sure women were buzzing around you like doxies."

"You think I'm hot?" He asked slyly.