Oh man, I haven't written fanfic in years but I recently started reading again and got really inspired. Hopefully you'll like this story, it's a modern AU set in London and I'd just like to point out that I've greatly exaggerated the dangerousness of Hackney for story purposes. I actually lived in London a couple of years ago but for some reason I've chosen to set the story in places I've never visited so please forgive any glaring errors. Also, as the name implies, I'm Swedish and as such the grammar isn't always flawless so please feel welcome to point out any errors I've missed there. The title is from a song called Don't Bring Flowers After I'm Dead by Eric Hassle so check that out if you'd like.
The yellow neon sign shone brightly in contrast to the dark sky above. The first letter A of the sign twinkled, suspiciously close to flickering out completely. A young girl stood, watching the exterior of the bar in trepidation. With it's small and run down attached houses, this place held no similarities to the quiet suburban home she'd spent the past twenty years of her life growing up in. Although they were located in the same city, Richmond and Hackney felt like two entirely different worlds. Whereas the young girl had never felt afraid when stepping out in Richmond, no matter the time, she hardly wished to leave her car only for a few minutes. It hardly helped that Hackney, and Clarence Road in particular, had a reputation that preceded them.
Sighing, she placed a well manicured hand upon the grimy door of the Marauder's, pushed it open and walked inside.
It was… not how she'd expected it. Not exactly as grimy as the exterior would have you believe, but nothing like the pubs scattered around Richmond she'd frequented since her eighteenth birthday. Mostly, she was rather struck by how empty it was. Although it was just before dinner time, she'd thought a place like this, in an area such as this, would host more patrons at any hour than the three - including the barman - that was currently in.
The barman was quite possibly the shabbiest man she'd ever laid eyes on. His shaggy, sandy brown hair was long enough to fall into his eyes, and he shook his head several times to get it out of his vision. The shirt clinging to his back was checkered in red and black and made out of a thick, fluffy material that immediately drew her mind to lumberjacks. Underneath the shabby surface, although he must be near her parents in age, she found him rather attractive.
The door fell closed behind her with a muffled thud, and the barman, who'd been in the middle of wiping down the bar with a rag that looked like it did more damage than help, looked up and met her gaze with a look of surprise. No doubt she wasn't the quintessential customer, what with her white blouse, black pencil skirt, heels and hair in a sleek bun.
It took her almost ten steps to reach the bar. She reached out, as though to lean against the surface, but thought better of it when she saw the dirt coating the wood and straightened up. Instead, she reached a hand across the bar in introduction.
"Hello, my name is Hermione Granger." She introduced herself. The barman looked questioningly at her proffered hand until, in shame, she retracted it. Hermione ignored the blush colouring her cheeks. "I'm looking for a Remus Lupin, he isn't here by chance?"
Hermione shifted a little uncomfortably when the man met her gaze again, only to drag it up and down her body with an obvious look of suspicion and disdain.
"What do you want with Remus?" Asked the bartender, in a voice that contrasted his harsh looks completely with it's honeyed smoothness.
"Never you mind about that, it's a matter between him and I." Hermione couldn't stop the haughtiness to leak into her voice, not matter how she tried. Her chin raised, she stared the bartender down, challenging him. She only hoped he couldn't detect the slight nervousness in her eyes.
He stared her down for a couple seconds, then nodded his head towards a door behind the bar.
"Why don't you step into the office and we'll have a little chat?"
Hermione narrowed her eyes. Despite her better knowledge, some kind of instinct told her she could trust this man. She debated the matter, she was in a real pickle, and as far as she knew Remus Lupin was the only one who could help her, on the other hand, her instincts weren't perfect and she didn't trust any of the other patrons to come to her aid should something happen to her. In the end, Hermione figured she didn't have much of a choice. She desperately needed to find this Remus Lupin, so in the end she didn't have much of a choice.
"Fine," mouth pursed and arms crossed she agreed, and rounded the bar desk to follow the stranger into the backroom. Really, not one of the smartest choices she'd ever made and her professors had said she was the cleverest student her year!
The backroom was small. It held small appliances on a counter, a coffee machine, microwave and refrigerator. In the middle of the room was a round wooden table with matching chairs, and a old, battered green couch pushed against a bare white wall. Hermione noted the lack of decorations, no flowers or plants where there to liven the somber room, no paintings on the wall, not even a bloody poster. Oddest of all was the metal safe in the corner of the room. Hermione didn't think she'd seen an actual safe outside of movies and TV shows and part of her brain felt like they belonged to gangsters and mob heads. However, it might make sense for a bar in this area of London to have a safe tucked away, the risk of robber had to be significantly higher than Richmond.
The barman rounded on her once he'd closed the door behind them and Hermione took a preemptive step backwards. She stumbled a little on her heels when the back of her thighs made contact with one of the chairs behind her and she felt a flair of panic rising up. This was a stupid idea, she should have listened to her judgement and looked for another way to find this Remus Lupin instead of putting herself in this precarious situation. She almost twisted her ankle when she moved in a hurry around the chair, putting some form of obstacle in between herself and this stranger.
Dear lord, how come she hadn't noticed the feral features on his face, the animalistic predatory way which he moved in? A shiver ran through her body when she noticed him moving towards her, and he must have seen her quaking in her shoes because in a rather unexpected move he froze and held his hands up in surrender.
"I'm not going to hurt you," he said indignantly, he sounded almost annoyed with her and Hermione wanted to snort out loud. How the hell was she supposed to know that, better safe than sorry, right?
"Yes, well, you'll excuse me for not taking your word for it," she raised her head a little, perhaps in order to appear more confident than she was. "Now, please, where can I find Remus Lupin?"
The bartender, still holding the dishrag, threw it over his shoulder in a move Hermione found unexpectedly attractive, "You're looking at him. Now tell me what you want."
Hermione pursed her lips, annoyed. "You could have just told me."
Remus raised an eyebrow. "I'm telling you now."
Her fingers curling and uncurling, Hermione gave an exasperated sigh. The man had clearly set out to annoy her and Hermione would be damned if she gave him the satisfaction of a reaction.
"I'm in a pickle-" she started. Although her mother had explicitly told her to trust the man Hermione felt wary of disclosing too much of her rather unfortunate situation. Remus Lupin seemed trustworthy, and he had her mothers hard-to-come-by glowing commendation, but still, even if he was, the man might disclose the wrong details to the wrong people and then she'd really be in trouble. "- And I need some help."
Remus actually scoffed and Hermione's expression settled into one of indignity. "Get out."
"Wha-"
"I said get out!" the man practically growled, "I don't know who you think you are, little girl, but you clearly have no idea of who you're talking to. I am not in the business of picking up strays from the streets and I suggest you get the hell out of here before you get tangled up in something you really have no business getting involved in."
"Is that a threat?" Hermione might be clever, but she was well aware she was also stubborn and prideful, and definitely not the kind of woman to be intimidated by anybody, no matter if he had defined muscles straining against the fabric of his shirt and the look of somebody who had seen and done things he shouldn't have seen nor done.
"It's a promise," Remus said, voice a deep rumble.
"Well, clearly you're no help I cannot believe she sent me here," Hermione spat, stalking around the chair towards the door. She was startled when, as she moved to push past Remus, he grabbed her arm harshly.
She toppled backwards a bit at the inertia, then whipped her head back to glare at the elder man.
"Who sent you?"
"Since you've made it pretty clear that you will not be helping me in any way I fail to see how that is any of your business."
Hermione was surprised to see a smile tugging at the corner of Remus' lips. He didn't let go of her arm, but his grip loosened a little.
"You are far too spunky for a young girl in this situation, you know that right?" he told her.
"Well I'll be damned if I go down without a fight, you don't know it but I can actually take care of myself."
This time an actual smile graced his lips, although short-lived. Hermione was suddenly struck by how much younger he looked when he smiled. At first she'd thought he was around her parents in age, but the way the smile lit up Remus' face took years off of it. He must be a decade younger than them, at least.
"Just tell me who sent you."
Hermione raised her head towards his, defiant look in her eyes. "I am not going to tell you who sent me, but she did say to tell you Monica Wilkins sent me, whatever that means."
Hermione had been confused, to say the least, when her mother had told her, with the panic in her voice reflecting in her eyes, to find Remus Lupin and tell him Monica Wilkins had sent her. In all her twenty years of life, Hermione had never heard her mother or father mentioning either a Monica Wilkins or a Remus Lupin. As far as Hermione had been concerned they had lived a quiet suburban life. Richard and Jean Granger had successful careers as a lawyer and a financial manager respectively, the oddest thing about them had been their obsession with Shakespeare, and given that they were the quintessential Brits, that really wasn't very abnormal. Hermione had grown up in a large six bedroom detached house and her parents had taken her on vacations each year, she'd never had to worry about university scholarships as her parents had paid in full and when she wanted a sabbatical there was never a question or worry about money. In short, Hermione had grown up wanting for nothing, a stereotypical British upper class, she was well aware of the privileges her parents and life had afforded her.
Richard and Jean were the kind of parents who enjoyed crosswords on the weekends, and their idea of an exciting outing was afternoon tea at the Dorchester. The wildest Hermione had seen her mum was when Jean indulged in a glass of complimentary champagne whilst visiting them more luxurious shops on Bond Street. So it was quite a bewilderment how Hermione had found herself in such an outlandish situation, why these mysterious names had suddenly appeared and why her parents trusted Remus Lupin, the man running a seedy Hackney bar, above all else that they might entrust him with their only daughter's life.
While the name Monica Wilkins didn't mean anything to Hermione until a month ago, it clearly meant something to Remus Lupin for his arm fell slack against his side as he looked at Hermione in disbelief.
"Monica Wilkins sent you?"
Hermione knotted her eyebrows together. This Monica Wilkins kept getting more and more intriguing the more she learned of her. Apparently connected to her mother, and important enough to this Remus Lupin that he might react in this way upon hearing her name.
"No. I have never met a Monica Wilkins in my life, I hadn't even heard the name up until a month ago. Who is Monica Wilkins?"
Remus ignored her question. Part of Hermione thought he genuinely hadn't heard it, so shocked did the man appear. "The person who sent you, did she tell you anything else? Did she tell you where Monica Wilkins is, how to contact her?"
Hermione shook her head. Although she'd tried to, she'd never forget the day she'd first heard Monica Wilkins' name. The day her whole life had changed. Hermione had always prided herself on her knowledge, it was her weapon of choice, it was her shield. Knowledge kept her sane and gave her control. Hermione needed control. Lately though, she felt as though everything she'd known was wrong. Hermione felt lost, and she couldn't solve this by going to the library. She didn't know how to solve it at all, and that feeling was quite akin to an itch she couldn't scratch, Hermione found.
"She said Monica Wilkins has been compromised, that the D.E. had found her, whatever that means." Jean had been in quite a rush when she explained to Hermione that she needed to go to Remus and pushed at piece of paper with Clarence Road 112B - take care of her written in Jean's signature neat handwriting into Hermione's hand. "She'd mentioned a Tom, I think, it was kind of rushed."
Remus nodded for several seconds, so long that Hermione thought he'd broken. Then he stumbled backwards and fell onto one of the chairs.
"Bloody hell," it was said no louder than a whisper and the phrase curiouser and curiouser flew through Hermione's mind. A very inopportune moment to think about Alice in Wonderland, she scolded herself, and watched how the large man seemed to almost deflate in front of her.
Hermione took a hesitant step towards Remus, then halted. She was at a loss for what to do, it was as though she was confronted with a gigantic puzzle but pieces were missing. Despite her mind working in overdrive, she couldn't make out the full picture only shapes and colours here and there. It felt like she was missing vital information.
Remus dragged a hand over his face, the weary look had him looking older again. "How did she know who Monica Wilkins was, the person who sent you?"
"I… I don't know," Hermione admitted reluctantly, "I got the feeling she knew her intimately, although she'd never mentioned Monica to me before. Oh, she told me to give you this,"
Hermione handed over the note her mother had pressed into her hand a month ago, again doubtful to why her mother's scribble would matter to someone who Jean, to Hermione's knowledge, never had met. Once again she was rewarded with more questions when Remus seemed to accept the note as evidence - evidence of what she couldn't figure out, though it was as if his whole demeanour changed then, something in the air that she couldn't quite put her finger on was different.
"What do you need help with?" Remus seemed resigned, and Hermione wondered what had changed. Did he know her mother's handwriting and if so, from where? He certainly didn't work with her, and any time Jean didn't spend in her office she'd spent with her husband or Hermione. Not to mention that she couldn't see Remus in her areas of London and she definitely couldn't see her mother in Hackney with her Chanel tweed suits and prim looks.
"I need a job, and a place to stay."
Remus sighed, then fished a phone out of the back pocket of his jeans. "You can work here at the bar, I could use the help not to mention that some feminine company might encourage customers. As for accommodation, I'll give Arthur a call, they'll give you a good price for a room."
What do you think?