A/N: basically I can't go to London without coming up with cute wolfstar scenarios.
The Rest is History
Sirius had been to the natural history museum at least half a dozen times, but whenever he got the spare time to wander around London, he kept going back. It wasn't that he was particularly cultured, despite the best attempts of his mother back when he was a child – it was mostly because he liked to look at the dinosaurs. He hadn't been one of those rambunctious children who rushed around smashing down mountains of lego with plastic t-rexes or anything like that, but he appreciated the exhibit none the less: there was something fascinating about the remains of the creatures who were so much bigger and more complex than anything Sirius could imagine, and the cool animatronic dinosaur towards the back of the room always impressed him.
It was a brisk spring day outside, and Sirius was supposed to be meeting James, who insisted on dragging him around London for suit fittings and button picking and all of those weddingy things that he was very pleased James was excited to do, but which would inevitably end up with misty eyes, a long time letting old men measure his inseam, and hours of Wedding Talk.
Sirius didn't mind Wedding Talk. He actively engaged in it most of the time, but with James and Lily's wedding less than a month away, everything was getting very intense and somewhat stressful. They should have been meeting at midday, but due to a mix up with the trains, Sirius had arrived in London much too early, and James was running late. So he had a couple of hours to kill.
It was late morning on a Monday, so the museum was relatively quiet, and the queues, when there were any, moved quickly. As usual there were a few groups of school children around, moving in herds around the exhibits as their teachers attempted to keep track of them all. Sirius wasn't bothered by them, even though they could get in the way; their excitement was sweet and somewhat contagious.
It was when he'd walked through the majority of the dinosaur exhibit, and was on his way down the ramp towards the huge animatronic t-rex, which thrashed its head and roared threateningly, that Sirius came across a particularly frazzled-looking teacher. He was a head taller that Sirius with hair that was somewhere between blond and brown and he was wearing an expression of pure exasperation.
"Come on now," he insisted, trying to draw a group of around fourteen children away from the spectacle before them. "We have to let other people see too, and Jonathan will you please put that Gameboy away, I'm sure Pokemon can wait."
"Gameboy?" the child on the teacher's right mocked. "You're so old." He took a disdainful look at the dinosaur, then shrank past the teacher into the next area, followed by the rest of his peers who gathered nearby and began to look, with mixed levels of interest, at the interactive screens around them.
"Tough crowd?" Sirius asked, approaching the teacher, who was still hovering in front of the dinosaur.
The man turned to him and sighed. "You have no idea."
He was a little sweaty, Sirius noticed, in a light blue shirt buttoned mostly to the top, and a brown cardigan that was too long in the sleeves.
He was also kind of cute.
"Have you been here before?" Sirius asked.
"Hmm? Oh, yes, of course. It's much more pleasant when you aren't trying to control a group of eight year olds."
"I can imagine," Sirius grinned, "you look like you could use a break."
"It's been a long morning," the man agreed, tugging at the collar of his shirt, "and unfortunately I don't think I'll get a break until I'm in bed for the night."
"I know what -
"Mr. Lupin!" A girl interrupted, dashing up to them with a horrified expression and grabbing onto her teacher's sleeve. "Kyle said he's going to climb up to try and reach the pterodactyl!"
Sirius glanced past them towards the group of children, and sure enough, one little boy was trying to hoist himself onto a console close by.
"No!" Lupin shouted, rushing over to the group, "Kyle, get down now."
The boy hopped back down to the floor, looking completely innocent. "I just wanted to see it close up," he complained.
"Of course you did," he sighed, turning to look mournfully at Sirius with an expression that said quite clearly, 'you see what I have to put up with?'
"I think we've seen enough dinosaurs for today."
There was a collective groan from the children gathered around him, and Lupin rolled his eyes. "I know, I know, but there's still plenty of other things to look at," he told them.
He took a moment to count the children, and must have found them all present and correct, because he nodded a moment later then looked back up to Sirius.
"Well, we should go. Enjoy your day -" he paused, looking expectant.
"Oh, Sirius."
"Enjoy your day, Sirius," he smiled, his gaze lingering for a moment before his attention was again caught by one of the kids.
"You too, Mr. Lupin."
"It's Remus," he smiled, before turning and leading the group of children out of sight.
Sirius turned back to the t-rex, which was still growling and moving imposingly in front of him. Maybe, he thought to himself, he'd endeavour to bump into the attractive teacher a couple more times before the day was out.
There were too many people in the museum. It was lunch time, and Remus and Molly had managed to cram both their groups of children around a couple of the larger tables in the café. There was, however, one missing.
Despite the disapproving looks of the people around him, Remus climbed onto a nearby chair, peering out across the sea of tourists with their flashing cameras and irritating ability to stand exactly where he was trying to look.
"I swear he was here when we left the mammals," Remus said frantically, looking back at Molly, who was asking his kids whether anyone saw Jonathan slip away. All she got in return was a collection of blank faces and shrugs.
"Okay," Remus said, trying not to panic, "I'm going to go and look for him – can you watch all of them until I get back?"
"Of course," Molly replied, patting his arm gently and trying not to look worried. "Go on, I'm sure he's somewhere close by."
Remus nodded, turned back towards the entrance they'd come in, and hurried back along the corridor.
Sirius liked the gift shop. After perusing a couple of the other exhibits that he was less familiar with, he'd retreated back towards the main hall and found himself looking at the large collection of gifts and souvenirs. He lingered briefly by a woody coloured scarf with a pattern of small brown deer's, thinking that Lily would like it, before his attention was caught by a small boy in a bright red school jumper who was pulling enthusiastically at the tail of a stuffed lizard, trying to get it down from a shelf.
Glancing around, Sirius saw no sign of any of the boy's schoolmates, nor the teacher who he had hoped would be nearby.
Sidling past a couple of people inspecting some t-shirts, Sirius walked up to the boy and dislodged the lizard from its hanger, letting it fall down to the his level.
"Hello there," Sirius said curiously, "weren't you with Mr. Lupin's class?"
"Yeah," the boy shrugged idly. "I got bored."
"I see," Sirius nodded. "I don't suppose you happened to tell anyone where you were going?"
The boy looked at Sirius as if he'd gone quite mad.
"No." Then he turned and started walking away.
"Wait!" Sirius called, walking after him. "Where are you going?"
"To buy this," the boy replied, holding up the lizard as if it were obvious.
"Right," Sirius replied, completely bewildered by the bluntness of the child. "How about after that I help you find the rest of your class again?"
The boy assessed him over the top of the multi-coloured lizard, then said suspiciously, "okay, but if you try to kidnap me, I'll scream."
"No kidnapping," Sirius promised, holding his hands up defensively. "But we should get you back - people will be worried."
By the time Remus crossed out of the blue zone and back into the main hall of the museum, he was red in the face from rushing around, and well and truly panicked. How could he have lost one of the kids? By now anything could have happened to him – he could have wandered outside alone, or someone could have taken him. Remus shook the thought from his mind, too dismayed to even contemplate it, and headed for the information booth in the corner, where hopefully he would be able to get some help in his search.
He was struggling to pass by a group of enthusiastic tourists taking pictures when he heard someone calling his name.
Turning, Remus saw Jonathan waving to him from across the hall, clutching a carrier bag with a stuffed toy poking out of the top, and holding the hand of the man he'd met earlier.
Remus gawped at them as Sirius spotted him and headed over, smiling amicably the entire way.
Oh god, Remus thought briefly as they stopped in front of him, he's going to think I'm a complete idiot.
"Professor Lupin," Sirius greeted with a fake formality, "I believe you might be looking for this." He gestured down to Jonathan, who was once again inspecting his new toy.
Remus opened his mouth as if to talk, but ended up letting out a huge sigh as the relief washed over him. "Thank you," Remus breathed, staring down at the boy with a mixture of annoyance and joy. "I thought something horrible must have happened – where was he?"
"Gift shop," Sirius said, gesturing to the toy lizard Jonathon had now abandoned in favour of his Pokemon game.
"Of course." Remus shook his head. "Thank you, again," he laughed, feeling foolish. "Let me, I don't know…" He looked down at his watch. "We still have half an hour of their lunch time left; let me buy you a coffee or something, to say thank you."
"There's no need to thank me, really," Sirius smiled, "but I wouldn't say no to a cup of coffee."
Back in the café, they found a small table close to the school group where Remus could still keep an eye on the children while Molly looked after them.
"She seems nice," Sirius said as he nursed a cappuccino. He wasn't one for fancy coffee really, but by the time they'd got to the front of the queue he'd panicked and ordered the first thing that he's seen on the menu.
"Molly Weasley is a force to be reckoned with," Remus agreed. "She's got six kids of her own and another on the way, so she's more than used to handling troublesome children."
"I couldn't do it," Sirius said, shaking his head. "My mate James has started talking about having kids and it's terrifying – I'd be scared that I'd break them or something."
"You seemed to do well with Jonathan," Remus smiled. "I bet you'd be better than you think."
"Maybe," Sirius shrugged, taking a sip of his coffee and grimacing at the taste. "Not that I'll be having kids any time in the near future – but if James and Lily have one I'll probably come round."
"You must be very close."
"Oh yeah, I'm meeting James soon actually to look at suits for the wedding – it's only three weeks away now."
"I haven't been to a wedding in years," Remus said, "not since I will was 14 or 15, which of course wasn't as fun because I was one of the few sober people."
"You should come to this one!" Sirius grinned, only realising moments later that it was highly unusual to invite a stranger he'd just met to a wedding.
Remus was looking at him as if considering whether or not he was having coffee with someone who wasn't quite all there.
"What I mean is," Sirius clarified, "that I like you, and I don't even know if you're into guys which would probably have been a better place to start than 'come to a wedding with me' but you know, if you are then I would like it if I could see you again, minus the children. And then after that, if you want, you could maybe come to the wedding with me. My best man's speech is going to be excellent."
"I see," Remus said, and Sirius was relieved to see that he was smiling.
"Are you laughing at me?" he asked.
"No at all," Remus replied, "you're refreshingly direct."
"Sorry," Sirius shrugged, "I'm usually pretty good at the words thing."
Remus looked sceptical.
"No, really. You're alarmingly unsettling – I think it might be the cardigan."
"I did buy it especially to attract strange men on school trips," Remus agreed with a grin. He took his phone from his trouser pocket and offered it to Sirius.
"Give me your number so I can, as you said, see you again without the children."
Sirius did as he was told before handing the phone back to Remus, who immediately sent him a text to pass on his own number.
"I'll ring you later," Sirius promised, "after I've been marched through numerous shops and paraded about in tuxedos and what not."
"I look forward to it," Remus replied. "I think a tuxedo would look good on you."
"And this is the part where I walk away instead of making a joke about it looking better off me." Sirius smirked, standing up and straightening his shirt. If he wasn't careful he was going to be late meeting James off the train.
"You do realise that in saying you won't say it, you made the joke anyway, right?" Remus said, rolling his eyes.
"Oops," Sirius shrugged innocently as he backed away across the hall. "I'll see you later Remus Lupin."
"Yeah," Remus replied, and watched him push his hands into his pockets and walk briskly away. When he turned his attention back to the kids, Molly was smiling knowingly at him.
"Right then," he said, getting up and re-joining his class, "who's ready to go and learn about volcanoes?"