Who: Alecto & Remus When: Sometime in May Where: Remus’ apartment What: peanut butter & nutella cookie delivery Rating/Warnings: Low/None Status: Complete when posted
Alecto didn’t fully understand what she was doing most of the time when it came to Remus, but she was content to live in a state of denial that involved just never thinking about it and ignoring anything in her brain that tried to question her actions. Which was why she was here with a container of peanut butter and nutella cookies, standing in front of his apartment door and staring at it. She’d been standing there for a good five minutes before she raised her hand to knock.
Rebekah had given her the arched eyebrow look and a lot of other quizzical expressions that Alecto had promptly ignored and evaded. Any weird looks from Remus would be dealt with in a similar way. She’d initially packed twelve, giving herself twelve that she could eat, but then she figured if she was bringing them, she was probably going to end up eating some unless he was stingy, so she packed a few extra, leaving six at home, hidden in a container in her room that she’d charmed shut. No one was going to get in there now.
Now all she had to do was wait for Remus to open the door, which she decided was best done leaning against the door frame, turned a little to the side.
The knock filled him with a strange sort of dread. This whole thing made him feel a bit nervous, which was stupid, because he was technically an adult and having people come over to bring cookies wasn’t supposed to be nerve-inducing. Though - he wasn’t sure what, exactly, was going on here. Better to just go with it, really.
He answered the door and smiled, feeling immediately a sort of blush pass over his cheeks. How stupid. “For the record, you didn’t actually have to bring cookies, but I’m glad you did. Here, you can come inside.”
Alecto's gaze swept over him casually and she bit the inside of her cheek to keep from making a comment about the blush. "I said I was going to do it, so I did it." She shrugged slightly. "Plus, I'm forcing you to share with me, so there's that."
She walked inside, her expression neutral as she examined her surroundings. "Good news. I've never been to this building before." She didn't explain for a moment, just letting the comments linger for a minute as she continued to take everything in. "Which means I haven't had to photograph any crime scenes or dead bodies here." Her expression didn't change the entire time she spoke. "Also good news. I didn't bring my camera." She had her phone, but she could leave it in her back pocket.
After she was done looking around, Alecto looked back at Remus. "Nice place."
“Okay, well, that wasn’t something I was ever worried about but now it will consume my thoughts each night when I try to go to sleep.” Remus closed the door behind her and watched her look around, then shrugged. “I try to maintain a level of organized clutter. It looks very studious and grown up.”
His lips quirked up and he gave a slight laugh, then motioned to the living room. “Make yourself at home, I guess. Do you want a drink or something?”
“I always think about these things.” Which was only a partial truth. She did think about them a lot, but she couldn't really claim that her mind was a constant state of morbidity. Just a mostly constant state. She did notice some mild clutter, but she was in no place to say anything about it. Even if she was, the question was why would she? She had dealt with people who felt it was necessary to comment on cleanliness of your home or person. They usually frequented her parents’ parties. She disliked them. They were busybodies and she had no patience for them. It was part of why she'd gotten in the habit of saying morbid and peculiar things around them. The more you did that, the less they bothered you.
She didn't hesitate to seat herself on the arm of the sofa, always preferring that to the actual cushions unless she was tired. She liked feeling tall sometimes or at least not scrunched up. She peered at Remus quietly. “I don't suppose an aspiring professor such as yourself has coffee in his flat, does he?” She almost never asked for tea in American homes. She was particular enough that it made it difficult.
“Seeing that the aspiring professor is currently a faithless student, the answer is yes, yes he does.” Remus laughed as he went into the kitchen, where he proceeded to grab a French press and his coffee grinder. Yes, he was one of those people (his teas were all loose leaf, save for a few that came in sachets and he couldn’t bear to be without). “How do you take it?”
Remus was nothing if not accommodating. A people pleaser, some would say. But if he was having guests, then he was going to make them feel welcome, and that was that.
Alecto very nearly laughed herself, but she held herself back. She didn't quite understand why, but she was determined not to question anything. "Well, that's a relief. I was worried I was going to need to make new friends, which sounds really taxing and boring." Not to mention she liked having Remus as a friend...if that was what he was. She still wasn't sure. Mostly because she hadn't decided what exactly that meant. She was weird about people. More than she really wanted to address, but it was mostly because she didn't trust most people outside of Amycus...and she couldn't even trust him all the time. Not like she could when they were younger. If it was important, Amycus would be there, but their ideas of important didn't really sync up a lot of the time. It made her feel out of sorts in general about people. Or at least about forming close friendships...or anything past that.
"Black like my soul is probably the answer everyone expects," she replied. "But a very small amount of creamer and more sugar than strictly necessary. I may be made up of bitterness, scotch, and impure thoughts most of the time, but sometimes I need a little sugar to balance it all out." She'd have to thank We Bought a Zoo for that line of thought one day.
“It’s always the bitter ones that like sweet things,” Remus said, giving her a grin from around the wall that separated kitchen from living room. He did a very good balancing act of cups, French press, sugar, and cream on his way to the coffee table. Then attempted to place it all out neatly. “-- Spoons. Just a moment.”
Too bad he didn’t have any clean ones. How embarrassing. As he quickly washed some, he felt awkward just standing there at the sink. Story of his life. “So. How do the dreams about Hogwarts go? How awful is it being a Slytherin?”
"What does that say about you, Remus Lupin?" She flashed him a smile at him before her expression grew surprised and then impressed as she watched him carry everything out to the living room. She'd been about to offer to help him, but he'd already put everything down and she hadn't even stood up yet. It was entirely possible that she was really bad at this whole thing. She quietly blamed having a Nanny who doubled as a sort of maid. Sort of. "Spoons. My only friends in this crazy world."
As Remus cleaned the spoons, she stood up and peeked in. "They're going pretty okay. Being a Slytherin is not awful, thank you very much. I do not appreciate your belief that we are not awesome. Your opinion seems very skewed."
In hindsight, Remus realized he could have just charmed everything to float over. It would have been very impressive, wouldn’t it have? But then he’d have to get the wand out and that would be awkward. Better to have it flourish from a pocket. Or, maybe, he’d learn how to do wandless magic, like he knew in his dreams.
“I have literally never see any good come from a Slytherin. Except for once. And that was more of a matter of him being forced into doing something nice for me, rather than actually wanting to do it on his own accord. I simply analyze the facts.” He returned, spoons in hand, and set one down next to a cup for her to add what she wanted to her coffee.
It would have been impressive. She hadn't tried all of that yet. She was doing basic stuff and working her way up to the rest of it. Otherwise, she didn't think she'd be nearly as impressed with herself. Alecto rolled her eyes. "Yes, but that's in your experience. You clearly have never been in Slytherin." It was difficult to explain how it felt because she was never good at explaining things like that. "I mean, some of us are annoying, I guess, but so are some Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs and those Ravenclaws that act like they are better than you." She shrugged. "I'm sure enough bad things come from the other Houses, but you're too focused on the bad coming from Slytherin, so you don't even consider it."
She took her coffee all the same, adding exactly what she wanted before stirring it and taking a sip. "You just want to see the bad in Slytherin for some reason."
“In actual fairness, and, now, bear with me here,” Remus said, “literally almost all the worst people in my dreams are Slytherin.” He sat down, and his brow furrowed for a moment. “And one Gryffindor. Which is … Well. That’s all a terrible lapse of judgment. But it’s my duty as a Gryffindor to maintain a healthy dislike and distrust of Slytherin. You know how it goes.”
He gave Alecto a smile and made up his coffee, then helped himself to a cookie. Which was actually amazing, and he hummed his agreement.
Another eye roll. "Well, I'm the best person in your non-dreams and so I have to disagree with your feelings." Yes, she was blessed with a ridiculous ego at birth. She made a small victory sound. "See? Evil Gryffindor! Anyone could be evil. What do you know?" She took a sip of her coffee, looking at him over the top of the cup as she did. "And I reserve the right to believe that most Gryffindors are pompous and get special treatment from the Headmaster." She shrugged slightly.
"Dumbledore doesn't really seem like the super amazing guy everyone says he is." All she remembered of him from the dreams was his odd habit of either eyeing you suspiciously or being overly cheery about lemon drops while you were in his office because you did something that warranted it. She was possibly a little bit of a troublemaker, but Amycus was usually in on it.
“Whoa - Whoa, whoa.” Remus held up a hand. “You can say all you like about Gryffindors, but Dumbledore is a good man. Better than I think some of us deserved.” He shrugged a shoulder and finished his cookie. That was all part of a story that definitely wasn’t for Alecto to know. Yet. Maybe one day.
“Okay we’ve done the obligatory dream talk. Now we can talk about normal things.”
"I can pretty much say anything I want, actually. I'm a Slytherin." It was probably childish to stick her tongue out at Remus, but she did anyway. It was only a little teasing anyway. It wasn't like he thought she was the kindest person in the universe or overly serious. "And I know what I saw." There was a slight shrug.
"Fine fine. I don't know what you count as normal things, though, but we can probably talk about them." She frowned for a moment, trying to think of something. "Any more drunken adventures?"