I do not, in any way, shape, or form, own Harry Potter. Warning: implicit twincest. Because it's funny to me.

It had been such a good day, despite my needing to cover for Steve. Steve's the restaurant's greeter, by the way, meaning that I had to spend my day showing people to their tables, which isn't usually a fun time. But, as I say, it was a good day, regardless: business was steady, the customers were being more polite to the servers than usual, the weather was amazing, and I got a call from a friend, saying that she was going to have a child. I know for a fact that she and her husband have wanted kids for the longest time (despite having met mine), so I was really happy about that. Having (honorary) nieces and nephews is supposed to be easier than having sons and daughters.

So all in all, I had been pretty happy at the way my day had been playing out. And then they came in. The introduced themselves as "Harry and Dannie Potter," and they were very obviously related. Their faces were near identical, the only real difference being that the girl's features were slightly (very slightly; the boy was rather effeminate-looking) more delicate. Beyond that, though? Damn near indistinguishable, at least in the faces.

Same exact eye shape and colour: almond and emerald, respectively. Same hair colour (pure black), though wildly different styles: the boy's was fairly long, considering it was a boy's, and almost indescribably messy (though it was clearly unintentionally so), while the girl's fell slightly past her shoulder blades and was rather silky-looking, as opposed to the boy's much thicker hair.

They were the exact same height and both were rather thin, though not skinny. Their skin was rather pale, as though they didn't spend much time outside, though it lacked the grey tinge of someone who intentionally avoided exposure to the sun. Rather, it looked like they simply avoided sunlight where possible and endured it where necessary. Both were dressed casually, the boy in black jeans and a white t-shirt, the girl in a mid-length dark blue skirt with a white blouse.

Absolutely nothing about them was remarkable, except maybe for their rather striking eye colour, and the slightly disquieting sense that I should know them from somewhere. Maybe they were related to someone from- No. I'm not going down that road. Even so, I couldn't help but feel that something about them was off. It took me a minute, but I figured out what it was as I was showing them to their table: despite clearly being, at the very least, first cousins, they had the dynamic of a couple. A romantic couple. They hid it well, and I likely wouldn't have noticed it myself if I hadn't had so much experience reading the chemistry between people (such a skill could be very useful for someone who needed to interact with people correctly in a brief amount of time, which, as the owner of a restaurant, I do), but it was definitely there.

Whatever. Not my place to judge, right? It's really none of my business. None of my business. None of my goddamned- oh, who am I kidding? How could you possibly expect someone to ignore that dynamic between two people who looked like they were siblings?

I figure I might as well subtly fish for information about them. No harm in that, right? Well, it might be a risk to my sanity, but I think I can live with that.

"Siblings, then?" I asked as they sat down.

"Twins," the girl answered.

I forced a chuckle. "I should have known. In fact, if I didn't know better, I'd say you were identical."

"Yeah, we get that a lot," the boy replied lightly.

"I'd imagine so," I said, handing them their menus. "Your server will be with you soon."

They thanked me as I left, walking over to the new kid, Alexander. "You up for a switch, Alex?" I asked. I'd been doing greetings and showing guests to their seats all day; I reckoned a change of pace might be nice. Besides, poor kid's not used to the job yet. He might appreciate a chance to kick back with something comparatively easy.

"Sure thing, boss," he replied, looking and sounding immensely relieved. "I've been coverin' tables eight, four, and two."

"They've all got their food, I see," I said. Come to think of it, Alex's been nothing but helpful since he started here. A bit of a sycophant, and not particularly bright, but that combination'll get you pretty far in a lot of businesses, hospitality chief among them. Well, "far" as in "allow you to keep a low-paying job," not "move ahead into a half-way decent position."

I started as a waiter myself, and I know what it's like for them. That doesn't necessarily mean that I pay them what they deserve, just that I have some degree of sympathy for their lot in life. We've got a bottom line, ya know?

"Yessir, I was jus' abou' to get those two kids you jus' sa' down at table six. Everyone else's got their food and looks happy enough."

"Good lad," I say, patting his shoulder patronisingly. Normally I wouldn't, but he is, as I say, a bit on the slow side. "You know what to do in front?"

"Yessir, Steve showed me on me first day," he answered as he hurried off to greet a family of four. Excellent. I love my kids to bits, but I'll be the first to admit that they can be bloody obnoxious at times. And one thing you learn about parenthood right quick? If your kid does something you think is obnoxious, what that means is that everybody around you sees it as nothing short of satanic warship. And, being that we adopted, I can safely say that it isn't a genetic thing.

So, all in all, I wasn't particularly happy that the two parents brought with them a coupla kids I'd put at three and five respectively. Thankfully, they went to table eleven, far away from my new jurisdiction.

Let me explain how the restaurant's set up: we've got two rooms, A and B, with eighteen tables: twelve in room A (which seats 36 people total), six in the slightly smaller room B (which seats 40). The even numbered tables in room A are for two people each, and are mainly geared towards couples (like the one I just seated? Patience, Lupin. Time will tell). The odd numbered ones had four seats each, and were mostly used by families like the one that just walked in. Meanwhile, in room B, we've got four six seaters and two eight seaters, mainly used for parties and occasionally for families of five or six, though we don't get many in here. Usually, people seated in there unconsciously try to out-shout the others, which is both hilarious and incredibly frustrating.

Regardless, I had my task: my mission, should I choose to accept it (and I kind of already had, considering that it was self-assigned), was to get the orders of the Potter twins, who may or may not have been dating, but were most certainly neither lying nor joking about their familial relationship, and studiously ignore the bloody children at table eleven. Of lower priority but still great importance: discover the true nature of the relationship between those two teenagers. Also of note: do not arouse suspicion in these matters. (Well, maybe be suspicious about Family Eleven; people's reactions to being subtly disregarded are always good for a laugh.)

In order to make the timing less conspicuous, I chose to visit Alex's other tables, informing them that Alex was needed elsewhere and that I was their new server, as well as making generic inquiries about whether or not they were enjoying their meals. I should bloody well hope they were, as I'm most assuredly vain enough to admit that I've got one hell of a chef. Besides which, nobody ever answers that question in the negative. Unless they're a complete arse, which is admittedly more common than one might expect in my line of work.

Once I had greeted all three of my other tables, I returned to the twins, who had put their menus down. "Have you two decided on you order?" I asked, deliberately failing to pluralise. Neither batted an eye at my seeming misstep, which I found rather suspicious.

"I thought you were greeting people and showing them to their tables?" the girl asked curiously.

"One of the waiters asked to switch with me," I lied, nodding towards Alex, who was now standing at the podium and looking completely ridiculous. Was he . . . he was. The man was attempting to flirt with a customer, and being really obvious about it. There go his brownie points. I wonder if there'll be any brownies left over at the end of the day. I certainly hope so.

Focus, you bloody idiot! You'd think that working in restaurants my entire adult life, I wouldn't be distracted by food metaphors, similes, and analogies anymore. Ah well. Such is life, yes? At any rate, I have work to do, as well as a job to pretend to do in order to actually do said work: solve the mystery of these twins and serve them their food. Respectively, obviously.

What, you thought my actual job would supersede my vain curiosity? Chyeah, not bloody likely.

The twins shared a bemused look which had a definite undercurrent to it. The only thing was, I couldn't quite tell what it was an undercurrent of. My first instinct says lust, but that could always be a positivity bias. Or my more general bias against teenagers as a whole, who, in my defense, do tend to be horny bastards. Is there a way to conduct a double blind experiment with this? I'd have to get a few more servers to interact with them for a while each, and I'm not sure I'd trust their judgment, regardless. No, totally nonviable; way too many variable I couldn't possibly account for.

"Is he flirting with her?" the girl asked incredulously.

"Trying to," the boy answered, eyeing the lad distastefully. The woman with whom Alex was flirting had . . . long black hair. Alright, definite parallel to the sister. Could be expecting Alex to try and flirt with her as well, and clearly isn't happy with the prospect. Could be either possessiveness or protectiveness. Inconclusive. Entertaining, though. If I had to guess, I'd say the boy hasn't yet noticed that he's growling. Quietly, yes, but it's definitely happening.

The girl, however, did notice, and threw her brother an exaggeratedly condescending look, to which he responded with a rather grandiose rolling of his eyes. Well, that could be fraternal bickering or romantic foreplay, and I don't reckon I'm qualified to determine which. With these two, there could be a fine line.

Dammit, man, focus! You don't know anything for sure yet! "In any event," I said, bringing their attention back to me. Their seeming readiness to forget my presence in favour of each other screamed obnoxious teen-aged romance, but it still wasn't enough to come to a real conclusion. "Your orders?" I asked again, this time pluralising just for the hell of it. Some would say I'm a prick, but I prefer the term . . . actually, yeah, fuck it. I'm a right bloody prick. And I'm perfectly fine with that.

"Right," the boy said, taking charge. And now I know who tops. Not that I ever wanted to, but it could be useful information, right? By this point, I'm confident that the two are, at the very least, in a sexual relationship, if not necessarily a romantic one. That the boy glanced at the girl's chest for a fraction of a second and subtly licked his lips at the word "orders" was something of a giveaway. It was also indicative of some rather kinky shit, so make of that what you will. On top of his rather suggestive actions was the way in which he performed them: unobtrusively. If I hadn't been watching for some kind of reaction, I likely wouldn't have noticed at all. Most intriguingly of all, though, he hadn't reacted similarly to me saying "order" singular. Fascinating. I just wish I had a bloody clue what it meant.

Wait, had he even been paying attention when I said "order," singular? I guess that wasn't quite as mysterious as I thought.

"I'll have the fish and chips," the boy said. Twat. Contrary to a disturbingly popular belief, being a werewolf doesn't enhance one's senses. That said, I used to work in a fish and chips place, and the smell . . . Suffice it to say, I get minor flashbacks whenever I'm forced to serve them. I don't want to sell it, but Chef insists. He's a twat, too.

"Chicken Ceaser Salad, for me," the girl said in response to my questioning look. I nodded and jotted their orders down.

"And to drink?" I asked, facing the boy.

Surprisingly, he inclined his head to the girl, silently deferring to her. "Water's fine, thanks," she said. Evidently he doesn't always top? I guess they take- Why the hell am I thinking about this? They're kids. About the age James and Lily's kids'd be, actua- Hell.

What'd they say their names were, again? Harry and Dannie? What were their kids' names again? Harold and Danielle? Fuck.

For Christ's sake, they're twins, named Potter, who're the right age and look disturbingly like James, all while having eyes that looked like they may have actually been transplanted from Lily. After being magically duplicated, of course. What was that curse, again? Gemino? Argh! Focus! How did I miss this?!

James and Lily's kids walk into my restaurant, are apparently shagging each other regularly, and are apparently shagging each other regularly! I know I said it wasn't my business, that it wasn't my place to judge, but these pricks just made it my business! Didn't they?

I hadn't spoken to either, any, of them since graduation, and the last time I heard anything at all from the wizarding world was when I heard that Sirius had betrayed the Potters to Voldemort, gotten James and Lily killed, and murdered Peter. Not exactly a happy parting.

Maybe I should leave well enough alone.

As I walk into kitchen to inform the line cooks of their new orders, I can't help but think of my old friends. I don't suppose that the way we parted was anyone's fault. Or rather, I suppose it was all of our faults. But the point is, I don't hold anyone responsible for it, least of all James or Lily. If I had to ascribe blame to any one person, it'd probably be Sirius, but that could always be because of what he did afterwards.

And now, almost twenty years later, here come their kids, waltzing into my restaurant like it's no big deal. It is a big deal: the twin children of my former best friends don't get to shag each other, be really obvious about it, and just stroll into my life. Naw, fuck that. I'll have to do something about this. The question is, what?

If, supposing, Clark and Mia started . . . dating . . . and James or Lily realised what was going on, what would they do? Probably curse me senseless. Well bugger. The reverse isn't exactly an option, is it? I suppose I could always try talking to them. I wonder if they've ever heard of me? Probably not, but it's worth asking about. Yeah, that's what I'll do. Not like anyone can complain, right? I'm the owner! I can totally abandon my responsibilities to satisfy my own ego! Alright, this might be slightly immoral.

That said, do I really care?

Making my way back to their table under the pretense of refilling their untouched water glasses, I went for the subtle approach. By which I of course mean that I blurted out, "my name's Remus Lupin!" Ignoring the strange looks I got from the other customers, I focused entirely on the twins.

"Remus Lupin who went to Hogwarts?" Dannie asked cautiously.

"Remus Lupin who helped write the Map?" Harry asked, much more enthusiastically.

"Yes to both," I answered with a smile. I gave my seldom-used but always-handy wand a casual flick, diverting the attention of the muggles present from the twins' table before I used a more complex motion to conjure a chair, which I sat in between the twins. "If you don't mind my asking, how did you two know my name?"

"Sirius told us about you," Harry replied, a pained look flitting briefly across his face.

"You've spoken to Sirius?" I asked sharply.

"He was innocent," Dannie said sadly. It didn't escape my notice (how could it?) that Harry took Dannie's hand and squeezed it, nor did I fail to notice the small smile she flashed him in return. I was so focused on their interaction that it took me several seconds to register their words.

"I'm sorry, did you say that-"

"Wormtail framed him," Harry confirmed. "Sirius thought he was too obvious as a Secret Keeper, so he convinced our parents to switch them at the last minute. Wormtail blew up that street, cut off his finger, and transformed when Sirius finally caught up to him."

"So is Sirius still . . ." I trailed off, not really wanting an answer. How could I possibly respond to this news? That somebody I had thought died a hero was actually a cowardly traitor, that the man I thought was a sycophantic slave to a Dark wizard was actually falsely accused?

"He escaped Azkaban three years ago," Dannie said sadly. "He met up with us, and he caught Pettigrew and showed him to us, but he . . ."

"Fudge never saw Wormtail," Harry said, picking up for his sister, who seemed unable to continue. "Our only consolation is that he wasn't Kissed."

"Sirius was executed?" I asked. For the first time in many years, my voice was shaking slightly. Harry nodded sadly. "I . . . I'm sorry for-"

"Don't be," Harry interjected, cutting me off.

"He was your friend in school, and this is a lot to take in," Dannie added.

"Well, that's true," I said, not really knowing how to react to this news. In the end, I don't suppose it really changed anything. Sirius was, after all, dead now. It's not like I can make amends, although I'd probably drink myself stupid when I got home. There was a long silence before I again blurted out what I was thinking. "Are you two dating?"

There were a lot of potential responses to that: anger, disgust, getting flustered, anything along those lines would probably be an appropriate response to my question. An inappropriate response would be for the two of them to share a look before turning back to me and asking, in eerily perfect unison, "what gave us away?"

Guess which one they went with.

"All the little things," I replied, much more calmly than I probably should have been feeling. "The little looks, the way you make excuses to touch each other, the way you," I nodded towards Harry, "looked at your" I did the same to Dannie, "chest and liked your lips, stuff like that."

"I didn't think anyone noticed that," Harry muttered sheepishly, quailing under the glare his sister was sending him.

"Obviously he did," she snapped, indicating me. "And you're kidding yourself if you think I didn't, too."

Harry raised his hands defensively and made a hissing noise that was evidently meant to have a calming effect on Dannie. Surprisingly, it worked; her face went from murderous to arsonous. She hissed something back, and the two continued like that for another minute-or-so, leaving me to figure out what they were on about by reading their faces. Eventually, once Dannie's face went shifted into a reluctant grin, Harry adopted an expression that I guess he meant to be seductive and hissed something else. Rather than hissing back at him, Dannie started purring.

"I'm now officially uncomfortable," I said, more to myself than to either of them.

"Oh, sorry!" Harry said, seemingly quite surprised.

"We kind of forgot you were here," Dannie added.

"I noticed," I replied sarcastically, raising a single eyebrow. "Wait here," I sighed, "I reckon your food's ready by now."

I stood up and went to get their food while the two of them started a whispered conversation. I spent a few minutes longer than was really necessary in the kitchen, trying to collect my thoughts. Really, the problem was that all of this was happening way too fast for me to really take any of it in: James and Lily's kids walk into my restaurant, tell me that Sirius was innocent and that Peter was a traitor, and two begin flirting, in parseltongue, and are remarkably casual about the fact that they share a bed. Could my day get any more surreal?

Upon leaving the kitchen to give the Potter bastards their meals, I learned that yes, it most certainly could. Sitting upon their table was a hundred pounds, all in twenty pound notes, along with a note.

Sorry for leaving so abruptly. Harry realised that there was something we had to take care of today. Don't worry about our lunch, we'll get some sandwiches or something later. Maybe we'll stop by again soon; it was nice talking to you, and this place is pretty close to our house.

-Ellie

P.S. By "something we had to take care of," she means "have sex."

-Harry

P.P.S. Please excuse my brother, who has less than no social graces.

-Ellie

P.P.P.S. I deeply resent that comment, and feel that I'm at least better than Snape

-Harry

P.P.P.P.S. That's nothing to brag about. We can sit here and argue over this all day, or we can go home and shag. Which do you want?

-Ellie

It was days like this that I regretted my decision to open a restaurant.

AN: Yeah, I just wrote a humor fic about twincest, what of it? This, like a number of the things I'm posting today as a Christmas present to the interwebs, was sitting on my computer for a while before I decided to clean it up and post it. At first, this was meant to be a lead in to a series about Harry and Ellie (Dannie to everyone but family and close friends), but I decided that a series about the various eccentric customers at Remus' restaurant would be way more entertaining. The original idea for the story was to have Harry and Ellie kill Voldemort after he uses them for the rebirthing potion at the end of their sixth year, then decide that the best thing to do from there on in is to rob all the Death Eaters blind, since they again completely escape any punishment for their distinctly illegal activities.

Then, I realised just how much fun it is to write an incredibly bitter character who spends his life interacting with weird people briefly before forgetting them and moving on to the next batch of oddballs: very fun indeed. The idea here is that the marauders had a massive falling out towards the end of their seventh year, and it led to Remus looking for a job in the muggle world. (This, in turn gives Peter a bit more motivation for his betrayal than pure cowardice: of the Marauders, Remus was the one he was closest to, and he came to blame and resent James and Sirius for driving him away. It's still not a good reason to sell an entire family out to a magical terrorist, but then again, neither is "I was scareded.") News of the Potters' deaths and Sirius' supposed duplicity were the final straws for him, and he then cut off all ties with the wizarding world. He married a muggle and adopted two kids, and eventually opened his own restaurant. Over the years, he became pretty bitter, as I think you can probably tell.

As for Harry and Ellie, I wouldn't say that they have a particularly healthy relationship. Kind of a no brainer, all things considered, but bear with me here: they grew up together with the Dursleys, hated by everyone but each other. Then they went to Hogwarts where everyone was obsessed with their fame and not particularly interested in them as people, then they went back and forth between the two environments for the next few years, going from one extreme to the other with no constants in their lives save each other. Then there's the fact that they've shared the smallest room in the Dursley's house their entire lives (the cupboard wasn't big enough for both of them, and there was no way that they were giving the freaks two rooms to themselves), so all in all, I wouldn't say that their developing an incestuous relationship is all that surprising. Bad, yes, but not surprising.

On top of all that, there's the issue of jealousy: neither wants for the other to start devoting their time to other people, so each sets out to fulfill any needs the other may have to prevent it. That's basically just an unnecessarily fancy of way of saying that because the two have been together their entire lives, neither one wants to lose that connection, which, to them, means that they don't need or want anyone in their lives apart from each other. They're a couple of teenagers, so hormones are gonna be an issue sooner rather than later; this then leads into Harry saying "if Ellie wants to start snogging guys, it'd better damn well be me," and Ellie saying "if Harry wants to start snogging girls, it'd better damn well be me." Then, a few years down the line, sex becomes an issue and they basically repeat the same thought process.

Also, they're pretty much the same person, so there's arguably some degree of narcissism involved.

I'm not, in any way, shape, or form, attempting to condone incest. I'm just writing a story where it's a thing because, to be perfectly honest, I figured it had a hell of a lot of comedic potential. Besides which, a lot of people who try to write incest do it because they have an incest kink, and they don't take the time to think about how realistic it is for the characters to be acting in the way that they are, so I wanted to write a story with a logical reason for it, if only to counter all the idiots whose entire thought processes can be boiled down to "incest hot! Write incest!"

Getting back to this story, I'll mostly treat it as a breather, writing a new "zany customers interact with their bitter and overly analytical host" story whenever I get writer's block for my other stories. So, with all of that in mind, happy holidays, thanks for reading, and Duke out!

PS: Can I just say that I absolutely love that cover image? The expression on his face is just priceless, like Dumbledore just announced his new plan to reform all the Death Eaters by hugging them until they see the error of their ways, and he's just sitting there, like, "dude, are you fucking kidding me?" Comedy gold, right there.