I posted this on my LiveJournal a while ago and now I'm posting it here. Nyah. This is the story of the mysterious battered suitcase in PoA, or, at the least, the story of how it came to be in Remus Lupin's possession ...

As for disclaimers ... oh yeah, not mine. And if you didn't get this already - SLASH. Male/male stuff, in other words. If you don't like it, don't read it. That is all.

The stranger was wearing an extremely shabby set of wizard's robes which had been darned in several places. He looked ill and exhausted. Though he seemed quite young, his light-brown hair was flecked with grey.

'Who d'you reckon he is?' Ron hissed, as they sat down and slid the door shut, taking the seats furthest away from the window.

'Professor R. J. Lupin,' whispered Hermione at once.

'How d'you know that?'

'It's on his case,' replied Hermione, pointing at the luggage rack over the man's head, where there was small, battered case held together with a large quantity of neatly knotted string. The name 'Professor R. J. Lupin' was stamped across one corner in peeling letters.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, page 59-60, UK paperback edition.

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'Hello there, professor,' Sirius grinned as Remus backed through the door of their flat, several large books in his arms.

He laughed appreciatively. 'Maybe you'll stop calling me that in ten years,' he said as he dropped his load onto a table, closing the door behind him. 'It's only a job tutoring Muggle ankle-biters, Pads; if it was anyone else you'd be disapprovingly cynical.'

'Ah, but if it were anyone else, they wouldn't be half as good at it as you're going to be.' Sirius' grin was still ear-to-ear and Remus began to feel a little suspicious.

'All right,' he declared, 'what have you done to my clothes?'

'Haven't done nothing.'

'Which means in proper English, that you have done something. So what is it? Will I be greeted by a wardrobe of dresses and skirts tomorrow morning? Or maybe you've swapped the salt and sugar again so that the first vital wisdom I impart is how to say hello to your breakfast again?'

Sirius looked terribly offended. 'Moony! How could you think something like that? The only crime I've committed is to be ridiculously supportive of my mental boyfriend who'd gotten it into his head that he wants to spend all day surrounded by screaming brats who won't appreciate his being around half as much as someone else does. Guilty as charged, that's me.'

'You've never been anything but guilty,' Remus laughed, quickly shuffling through the books in front of him; Sirius pouted and put his best innocent face on. 'sorry, you're not convincing anyone, Pads.'

'Fine,' he huffed, 'if you don't think I'm trustworthy you probably won't be wanting your present.' He stalked off into the kitchen.

Remus tried to ignore him, but the lure of probably chocolate was too great. 'You, er ... you got me a present?' he asked casually, following him and loitering by the doorframe.

Sirius, who was making a cup of coffee, snorted. 'Of course I got you a present. You're about to start one of your dream jobs, and keep it, probably, too, as there's about as much chance of them noticing a pattern to your days off and sacking you as ... as ...'

'As there is you turning into a rule-breaking trouble-maker with a soft spot for dogs, not to mention werewolves?' Remus offered with a grin, one eyebrow raised.

'Only certain werewolves,' Sirius said stoically, sloshing milk into his cup. 'Although I guess I have to admit that that sounds too much like me already, otherwise my present will have been a slight waste of money.'

Remus' ears perked up when he heard that. And here he thought Sirius would never stoop so low as to buy him a book ...

'And no, it isn't one of your great thumping hardbacks,' he chuckled, eyeing Remus. 'Far too practical. No fun at all.'

'If you've bought me something to scare the children with ...'

'Nah, a little too much fun for our Moony.' Sirius stuck his tongue out in a childish way, and Remus rolled his eyes. 'Come to think of it, you can barely contain your excitement for a change, what have you done with my Moony?'

He held up his hands with a smile as he crossed to the kettle Sirius had just finished with. 'Okay, I admit it, I've had him locked up in a cupboard somewhere; no doubt he's bored out of his mind. I think I was too jealous of the gorgeous prat he was living with.'

'Really?' Sirius preened. 'Well, I expect he's reading The Complete Works of William Shakespeare or something equally boring, it'll keep him amused for a good couple hours.' Suddenly, his arms were around Remus' back and shoulders, his mouth in his hair, on his ears, at his neck. 'Think you could keep me amused for a couple of hours?'

'Oh, I think I'd be up to that,' Remus muttered, turning away from the kettle and meeting Sirius' roaming mouth with his own for a few pleasurable minutes, until Sirius pulled away slightly, breathing heavily.

'Have to open your present first,' he chided, grinning widely as he abandoned his drink and pulled Remus into their bedroom.

'What ...' Remus started as Sirius dropped him and began rummaging around in the bottom of the wardrobe. 'Oh, no. If this is anything like that 'surprise' you got for Susie Alimanie's birthday ...'

Sirius paused in his search, leaning back on his haunches as he chuckled at the memory. 'No fear, Moony; I was young and thoughtless back then, I've grown up slightly since then.'

'So now you're old and thoughtless?' Remus asked innocently, perching on the bed and watching the loose shirt Sirius had blindly thrown miss its target pitifully. 'The Engorgement Charm isn't that big, Pads, what have you got stashed in there, a baby elephant?'

'Oh, ha ha, I get it, like in Muggle Studies, 'elephants never forget', how useful for a tutor.' Sirius' voice was muffled from within the enlarged wardrobe; only his arse was sticking out. Maybe he was aware that Remus was looking at it, maybe he was just being an exhibitionist (a mixture of the two was most likely) – at any rate, he gave it a little shake, making Remus snort, though he didn't adjust his line of vision. 'How very droll of you, Remus.'

'Maybe I can make myself a Sirius-clone in case you get lost in there,' Remus said conversationally, just before Sirius began to back out of the wardrobe. 'Oh, the beast emerges.'

'You could never copy me,' he announced, standing and turning so the present was behind his back. 'One of a kind, me. Unique. Close your eyes, Moony.'

'One can only hope,' Remus grinned, obeying. A moment later, something large and rectangular was being shoved into his arms.

It was a briefcase, he found. All brown leather and silver clasps, smelling very new and, probably, very expensive, though he pushed that thought aside. Sirius was always far less concerned about that sort of thing than he, and it was a gift, after all.

And a wonderful gift, at that.

'Sirius -' he breathed, turning it in his hands, wanting to admire it at every angle, and the way it felt to his skin. Then he stopped, suddenly spotting an inscription in the corner and dissolving into laughter.

Professor R. J. Lupin.

'Hey, this is the beginning of a long and fruitful career,' Sirius insisted with a smile, before his face fell into uncharacteristic soberness as he sat beside Remus. 'So ... you like?'

'Oh, I like, definitely,' Remus assured him, one hand already playing at the chest of Sirius' t-shirt as he laid the briefcase aside. 'In fact ...'

There weren't many words exchanged over the next couple of minutes, but as they shifted into a more comfortable position, Sirius' foot caught the case and sent it flying to the floor.

'Is it broken?' he asked as Remus quickly glanced over the edge of the bed, not sounding as though he cared much.

'No, it's fine,' Remus replied, but something else had caught his eye, and he leant down to pick it up.

'Oh, that,' Sirius said disdainfully as Remus showed him the large packet of Honeydukes' Best Chocolate. 'I just stuck it in the case, know how you get about chocolate. You done yet?'

'But it's chocolate, you can't expect me to just ignore it,' Remus told him teasingly, as he pushed himself back down the bed. 'You can pay attention to it later. Pay attention to me now,' Sirius pouted, and he looked and sounded so pathetic that Remus couldn't help but comply with a grin.

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