Author's Notes: Hints of Christmas, but not necessarily a Christmas fic. Also, I'm 22 years old and I still have problems with the proper use of a comma. I apologize.
Disclaimer: They're not mine, but you already knew that.
Part One: In which they solemnly swear.
"No, get away from me with those! I mean it, Remus! You'll make it worse," Sirius growled.
This was not the first thing Tonks expected to hear when she walked into Grimmauld place.
"Well you set the bloody thing on fire. It's defensive now," Remus snapped back.
Tonks moved her way to the kitchen, with what she found to be uncharacteristic and surprising stealth. As she successfully avoided her nemesis the troll stand, she found herself growing sufficiently intrigued.
"Are you telling me this thing has a mind of its own?" Sirius sounded scared now.
"No. Well... I suppose I'm not quite sure. Gah! Where's that blasted cream?"
Tonks entered the kitchen and stopped short, not quite ready for the sight that met her. Standing before her frazzled, half naked and covered in bright blue patches was one Remus Lupin. He was carrying a large pair of scissors and rubbing a thick paste on his neck, which he seemed to be the cause for the color change to his arms, face, a good portion of his chest, and several spots on his pyjama bottoms. Sitting at the kitchen table behind him was Sirius, who looked rather frightened, and was sporting a thick, ten meter mustache.
The two men froze and slowly, almost painfully, turned their heads to look at her. Horror spread throughout their features as the realization hit that they had been found in this state. Tonks did the only thing she thought appropriate and erupted in peals of laughter.
"What in the name of Helga Hufflepuff happened to you two?" she spluttered. She inhaled deeply and loudly, trying not to suffocate from her giggles. Sirius scowled. Remus flushed suddenly, dropped the scissors on the table, and grabbed his tweed jacket off one of the chairs. He threw it on and buttoned it, despite the fact that he was wearing blue paste instead of a shirt.
"Not what. Who," Sirius seethed, remaining rigid in his seat. Tonks figured he was trying to keep the mustache from growing any longer.
"We believe the blame for our current predicament falls on the Weasley twins," Remus explained.
"As if this damned house wasn't booby trapped enough," Sirius grumbled. "You'd think with Arthur in the hospital-"
"I had a nose the size of a cucumber yesterday, from a box of tissues upstairs," Remus interrupted in order to explain. "And day before that Sirius had the tiniest of butterflies coming out of his ear for three hours, compliments of a couple of enchanted q-tips. No doubt the latest batch of Wizard Wheezes prototypes."
"And the mustache and the war paint?" Tonks asked, her amusement battling her disappointment that she had missed so much.
"As Ginny explained it, Sirius made the mistake of eating what we now know to be a mustache muffin," Remus smirked.
"They were on one of Molly's blasted plates! How the bloody hell was I supposed to know?"
"And you?" Tonks addressed Remus, holding back laughter again.
"It seems my bath soap was replaced with the brand new Ignatius Itching bar. It's time released so you don't start itching until some hours after your shower and it worsens from there. The blue cream is an anti-itch potion Poppy sent over. Bless her."
"You're cured then?" Tonks pressed.
"More or less. You just have to wait for this kind of magic to wear off. The cream is helping though," he contradicted himself as he started scratching his back.
"I'm not waiting for this sodding mustache to go away!" Sirius complained.
"Well you won't let me cut it off, and our attempts to remove it magically just set it on fire and made it grow another few meters. From where I'm standing Sirius you'll have to wait this one out," Remus said irritated.
"Cutting it should work though," Tonks blurted. The men looked at her.
For some inexplicable reason Tonks felt a bit shy as Remus cast an inquisitory glace her way.
"Well, think about it. Fred and George are making these mostly for the students. How would school kids try to remove this? Magically. I saw something like this at work over the summer. A pair of obliviators had to alter the memories of a couple of muggles who saw on-sight healers cut a young wizard out of the facial hair that filled his flat. The thing had kept growing, because the prat didn't get that it wouldn't magic off."
The men just eyed her curiously. "It filled his apartment?" Sirius asked, failing at not sounding panicked.
"Yeah well he didn't stop to think did he?" She enjoyed the look on his face a little too much. "That bloke sounded like he deserved it though. Apparently, he'd been rather nasty to an ex of his. Then he got a delivery of mysterious pastries and ate them without question. Not particularly bright if you ask me."
Remus considered this for a moment. "Do you remember his name?"
Tonks shook her head, "Nah, it was just one of those stories that spread around the office y'know. Revenge in the form of a giant mustache is pretty blasted hilarious any way you slice it."
"We need to work on slicing THIS!" Sirius shouted, pointing wildly to his mustache.
They looked at him, and then promptly ignored him.
"Although, come to think of it," Tonks began, glancing back at Remus, "I think I remember Kingsly saying the girl was one of your lot." Remus stiffened, and Tonks realized how that would have sounded to him. "I-I mean she was a Gryffindor!" she stammered and threw her hands out as if to physically stop his thought from going any further. "A girl. Of Gryfinndor House." She dropped her hands and continued to splutter out everything she could remember about the incident in one long breath. "The bloke ate the only evidence but everyone was sure it was the girl, I think King said her name was Angelina something but yeah the healers used plainnonmagicscissors!"
She finally stopped and sucked in a breath. She was a little annoyed by the smirk playing on the corners of Remus' mouth. She didn't even want to look at Sirius because she could feel the laughter he was holding in reverberating in the air.
Tonks watched as Remus seemed to silently consider her for a moment, then swiftly grabbed the scissors and leapt across the table. Before Sirius could protest, the mustache was snipped off in two quick clips. Sirius let out a string of obscenities as he pushed Remus away. They waited for a moment and as imagined, the mustache did not grow back.
"Angelina Johnson is who I think you're thinking of," Remus said, giving a little wink. "And if I recall she was rather close with Fred and George."
The wink squeezed at something inside her, but she recovered long enough to beam at him. "A well thought out deduction Remus."
"Why thank you, Nymphadora."
"Quite welcome," she all but giggled, and then added, "And don't call me Nymphadora."
Sirius watched the exchange and grumbled to himself. Tonks thought she heard something sounding suspiciously like, "Get a room."
Before an awkward moment could set in, Tonks steered things in a new direction. "How about I put some tea on while you lads finish straightening yourselves out, eh?"
"Sounds like a good idea," agreed Remus. He still looked rather annoyed at the situation, but since her arrival Tonks could see the humor in his eyes. She smiled and turned to the stove.
Around a half hour later everything seemed to be more or less back to order. Sirius was looking, if possible, a bit scruffier than normal, and Remus had washed the blue paste from his neck and face, though the goop seemed to have temporarily stained his neck a little. He was wearing a clean-if rather threadbare-jumper, and somehow the image of him without it was stuck in Tonks' mind. Before what she had just seen, she could barely recall getting a glimpse of Remus' forearms. The man was so self-conscious of his scars he failed to notice that he was really quite fit. She cut the thought off at the knees. He was her coworker for Merlin's sake and those thoughts were far from professional.
"So Fred and George Weasley: geniuses? Or menaces to society?" she asked, in order to force another thought into her mind. She set their cups down on the table.
"I'm not sure how much I constitute society, but I would have to cast my vote for the latter," Remus said. Tonks opened her mouth to scold him for this self-disparaging remark, but he continued after a sip of tea, "By the way, thank you for bringing a touch of sanity to this afternoon." He gave her a broad smile and she felt her heart do a little flip as the reprimand died in her throat. Bloody hell. All this time around teenagers was starting to get to her.
"M'pleasure," she responded, "Though we're worse off than we thought if I'm the sane one around here."
Remus laughed. His eyes crinkled pleasantly and his teeth glinted. For all his brooding and self hatred, the man had a wonderful grin. Isn't that what Dumbledore told her would eventually be the end of Voldemort. The things that Voldemort himself was not capable of: friendship, happiness, and... Merlin's soggy trousers. A few more of those hopelessly soppy thoughts and Celestina Warbeck was going to owl to asking lyrical advice.
She met his eye again and saw the corners of her own mouth turn up once more.
Then again, there had never been a song about forbidden werewolf love on the wireless charts-
"Yes, well now that's over, we can begin plotting some proper revenge," Sirius interrupted her thoughts once more, clapping his hands together.
"Well everyone will be visiting the hospital for most of the day," Tonks nodded, "I'm sure you'll have plenty of time to come up with something good. And if you need any help..." she pointed to herself. She normally wouldn't encourage him, but it was only Boxing Day and he was already starting to sulk about the kids heading back to school.
"We appreciate the offer Tonks, but Sirius and I will not be seeking to harm couple of teenagers," Remus reproached, looking at Sirius.
"Oh yes we will!" Sirius exclaimed. "Lest you forget Marauder rule number two, Invigorate. Dominate. Retaliate."
"Sirius," Remus put his hand to his temple, as if he could already feel the headache coming on. "Don't you think we've gotten a little too old for such juvenile retaliation?"
Sirius looked thoroughly scandalized. "Too old? Us? Remus, this has nothing to do with age. This is about defending our title!"
"You make this sound like a sporting event!"
"This is far more important than any quiditch cup mate! Our Trouble Makers' crown is in serious jeopardy, being snatched from our very hands while our guard is down!" Sirius gestured dramatically attempting to demonstrate the snatching taking place. Remus just frowned at him. Sirius matched his look and went on, "For the love of Merlin, Remus what happened to your inner Marauder?" He pushed back his chair a little and folded his arms.
"He's exactly where he should be…on the inside," Remus said dryly, refusing to look at his friend. He traced the edge of his tea cup with his finger. "Those games we used to play are well in the past. I believe, as the oddly appropriate phrase goes, we should let sleeping dogs lie."
Tonks knew Remus was being too serious for his own good. She considered a gentle way to tell him this, but she only had a second to ponder the idea before Sirius started his own rebuttal. He stomped his foot on the ground loudly and then put his hand up to his ear.
"Did you hear that, Tonks?" Sirius said keeping his cupped hand behind his ear.
"You stamping your foot?"
Sirius did not move his hand and seemed to be straining to hear something. He had a concentrated look on his face as he stared at the ceiling. Then he shook his head and refolded his arms. "No. That was the sound of James Potter," he paused and gave Remus a pointed look, "rolling in his grave."
Tonks was a little taken aback by the lack of tact being displayed, even for Sirius. But Remus didn't seem phased by the outburst. Instead he gazed at Sirius with a completely unreadable expression.
"You promised," Sirius added. His voice was gentler than it had been.
What was promised, to whom, and when, remained a mystery to Tonks, but the words seemed to strike Remus. He sighed, with more sadness than frustration, and looked down at his cup again.
"We all did," he nodded.
"So how 'bout it?" Sirius said. He gave a ridiculously impish smile as he stood up, stretched his arm out over the table and held his palm out to Remus.
A surprised but genuine smile spread through Remus' features. He shook his head as he stood, as if unable to believe what he was about to do, before rotating his palm out and clapping Sirius' hand. The two then started a series of hand slaps and finger wiggles that were so intricate, Tonks wasn't sure if it was just very well rehearsed or if they'd actually charmed themselves to do it. The handshake ended with the men hooking their right pinkies.
"We solemnly swear," started Sirius.
"We are up to no good," Lupin finished. By the end both men were laughing heartily. Tonks stared on, not completely sure what she had just witnessed, but wishing for the first time since she met them that she could have known them as younger men.
Sirius and Lupin reseated themselves.
"I honestly can't believe we can still do that," Remus said, still laughing a little, "What were we 15, when James demanded we institute that? We were too old for it then!" He leaned back and sipped his tea.
Tonks looked at them a little amazed. The change was abrupt but undeniable. The men sitting next to her suddenly seemed years younger, less burdened, than the one's who had been with her moments before.
"It used to drive McGonagall mad. Said it made her dizzy to watch," Sirius reminisced. For his part, he looked more relaxed. It was as if it was the first time he believed a Dementor wouldn't floo into his kitchen and suck out his soul.
"Lily wasn't too fond of it either if I recall. Not after you and James broke that lamp attempting to show Harry." Remus was sitting a little higher in his seat, and gone was the slightly defeated slump that usually took up residence in his shoulders.
"James repaired it just fine. I think she was angrier we were attempting to corrupt a newborn."
Tonks just sat quietly, taking in the scene. Sirius leaned in to them. "So Tonks is on board too. You think we can have a decent trap set by the time everyone is home at five?" Sirius asked.
Remus glanced at his watch, and then gave Sirius an appalled look. "Six hours? My dear Mister Padfoot, I daresay we could never be that out of practice."