#wtmt

“You in, love?”

Mary’s voice reached him as he was standing in the kitchen, staring at the kettle and waiting for it to boil. He could feel his lips quirk upwards at the mere sound of her voice.

“Kitchen, making tea. Fancy a cuppa?”

“Sure.”

He could hear her dumping her bag onto the table in their sitting room, and by the time he’d taken down another mug from the shelf and dropped a bag into it she was standing in the doorway.

“You could do that with magic, y’know,” she said, leaning casually against the doorway as she watched him pour water into the mugs.

Remus hummed, a non-committal sort of noise, “I like doing it the proper way.”

“Magic’s just as proper,” Mary protested, but when Remus threw her a look her expression softened slightly, and she accepted the mug he held out for her. “Cheers.”

“Work good?” he asked as he stepped past her, back into the sitting room where he slumped down on the sofa, putting his feet up on the table, and grabbing the book he had been reading.

“T’was, mostly,” she called out as she disappeared into her bedroom, no doubt to change into something more comfortable the way she always did after work.

She emerged again a few moments later, her jeans and blouse replaced with a pair of worn-out pyjama trousers and an oversized jumper he had a strong suspicion came from his own wardrobe. She was clutching her tea tightly, feet hidden in a pair of slippers in the shape of nifflers.

She grinned brightly at him as she curled up in the window seat, a curious sort of expression on her face as she watched him. He could practically feel her eyes burning into him and he put his book down with a sigh, watching her with a raised brow.

“Awright, spit it out.”

She gave him a half-sheepish smile, taking a sip from her tea as if to steady herself and he couldn’t help but feel a nervous little tug in his gut. Whatever it was that made her hedge like this couldn’t possibly be good, because Mary never hedged, she always spoke her mind no matter what, especially to him.

“You remember Marlene and Dorcas?”

Remus had to think for a moment before he nodded. Mary had met them where she worked and had introduced them one afternoon when he’d stopped by on his way home. They were witches, he knew that much. Mary had been working at Merlin’s Hat, one of the busier pubs in Edinburgh’s magical part, for the past six months. Remus didn’t like going there much, but sometimes he made an exception because it made Mary so ridiculously happy.

They had lived in Edinburgh for nearly seven years now, and it hadn’t escaped him how Mary spent more and more time on Ravenclaw Road, Edinburgh’s version of London’s famous Diagon Alley (named after one of the four founders of Hogwarts). It wasn’t like Remus had never been, he just preferred keeping to the Muggle parts of the city. At first Mary hadn’t minded doing that either, the two of them both working Muggle jobs and keeping their magic to a minimum. They lived in a Muggle area after all, near Haymarket, and they didn’t want to draw any attention to themselves.

However, Mary had always been more curious about the magical world. They had never seen much of it growing up, even though Remus’ Da had taken them on field trips at times, but with Mary being Muggle-born and him having a Muggle mother they were accustomed to not using much magic at home.

All that had changed when they moved, though. In the village where they were from, magic had never been much of an option. Before they turned seventeen they had only ever performed magic, which wasn’t accidental, under the watchful eyes of Lyall Lupin, but once they moved down to Edinburgh they suddenly had magic on their doorstep. Ravenclaw Road was only a half-hour walk away and Mary had started to venture into that part of the city more and more often.

When she decided to quit her Muggle job at a bar in New Town to take up waitressing at Merlin’s Hat, Remus had noted how she suddenly started talking about people that were strangers to him. That in itself wasn’t surprising, Mary had always been the sociable one out of the two of them, but there was something about Mary surrounding herself with wixens that made him uncomfortable.

“Are you even listening?” Mary huffed at him and he looked up, guilty.

“Aye, sorry love. What?”

“Dorcas and Marlene,” she said again, an impatient sort of twist to her words, “they invited us to go out with them tomorrow night. Some of their old mates from school have moved up here and they’re going out getting sloshed tomorrow, apparently. Told us to join.”

Remus raised a brow, “Us? Really?”

Mary let out a little huff, not looking very guilty as she shrugged, “Awright, me then, but when I told them I was spending the night with your sorry arse they told me to bring you along.”

“IT’S CHRISTMAS!!!!”

The shout woke James with a jerk, and his heart did a dangerous stutter in his chest about the same time as a warm body landed half on him, and half on the person pressed up against him.

“Oof,” he heard Regulus grunt, and James echoed the sentiment as a sharp elbow dug into his chest.

“WAKE UP WAKE UP WAKE UP IT’S CHRISTMAS WAKE UP!”

“Salazar,” Regulus groaned but James couldn’t help but laugh, and he reached out towards the bedside table to grope around for his glasses.

He shoved them onto his nose, blinking at the boy who was bouncing excitedly on top of them.

“It’s CHRISTMAS!”

“It sure is, sprog,” James agreed as he pushed himself up into sitting, looking down at Regulus who was still seemingly trying to decide if he could get away with pretending to be asleep.

“What time is it?” he grunted eventually, opening one eye to look up at James.

“CHRISTMAS TIME!” Leo shouted. “Daddy, it’s Christmas !”

“It’s just gone six,” James offered, pressing his lips together so that he wouldn’t laugh out loud at Regulus’ pitiful groan. “I’ll get up, you go back to sleep, love.”

“But it’s Christmas ,” Leo said again, wide eyes looking between the two of them as if he was worried he hadn’t managed to get his message across.

“I know, kiddo,” James said with a laugh. “Let’s go downstairs and let Daddy sleep for a while longer, alright?”

“Fine,” Leo huffed as he climbed off the bed.

James leaned over to brush some curls out of Regulus’ face, pressing a soft kiss to his lips.

“Try and get another couple of hours in,” he mumbled softly, feeling a little jolt as Regulus smiled lazily up at him, grey eyes still hazy with sleep and James had a sudden urge to burrow back underneath the warmth of the duvet and curl up against him.

“Da, hurry !” Leo whined, and James’ heart did a little flutter as he pulled away.

It was a recent thing that Leo had started calling him that. James had never pushed him in that direction, he’d just been grateful that Leo seemed to accept him as a part of his and Regulus’ life at all.

“Okay, okay, I’m coming,” he said instead, pushing the duvet out of the way as he got up.