Remus slumps back against the bed with a relieved groan. His husband rolls off him with a groan of his own, nearing forty as they are, and settles against the pillow on his side of the bed. "Good show," Sirius says, holding a hand up expectantly. Remus huffs and gives him a limp high-five. "That was enough?" he asks tentatively. "Got the job done," Sirius replies easily, pushing himself up to sitting with a grunt of effort. He mutters a scourgify to clean himself and nods, satisfied, once done. "You can use the bathroom first. Toss me my pants?" Remus looks down at the floor, locating Sirius's pants. He tosses them to Sirius, then glances at the clock in the dresser. "That wasn't too fast?" His husband wiggles back into his pants and pulls the duvet up to his armpits. "Quick and easy. Another hump day for the books. Now I have time to finish the article I was reading," Sirius says, already reaching for his reading glasses and the copy of National Geographic on the bedside table. He'd been in the middle of reading it twenty minutes ago, before Remus had reminded him that it's Wednesday, which is a day of the week where they often have sex because, well, hump day—a stupid joke that has somehow withstood the test of time. Sirius puts his spectacles on and flips through the pages until he finds where he left off. Well. Suppose that's that, then. He does go to the bathroom to clean up. While Sirius is fine with a scourgify, Remus has never been able to shake the feeling that it doesn't leave one properly clean. One of his charming muggle quirks, as Sirius puts it. He dresses in his warm flannel pajamas, brushes his teeth, and blows his nose. By the time he retuns to the bedroom, Sirius is engrossed in his reading. The low light of the bedside lamp casts his features in a flattering glow: dark brows drawn together, sharp grey eyes darting back and forth behind his spectacles. He'd started needing them a few years ago. Remus thinks he looks terribly handsome in them. Sirius doesn't look up as Remus pulls aside the duvet and settles into his side of the bed. For a few ticks of the clock, he stares up at the ceiling. The pages of Sirius's magazine rustle as he turns them. "Does all of this feel a little perfunctory?" Remus asks. A beat. "A little what?" "Perfunctory." Sirius drops the magazine in his lap with a thud. "Perfunctory? What do you mean?" Guilt and embarrassment flood him immediately. "Ah, nothing. Nevermind." "No, not nevermind! Explain!" Deeply regretting opening his mouth, Remus scrubs a hand over his face. "Just, I don't know. Predictable. Routine." Sirius's eyes are wide. Slightly alarmed. "I thought you liked our routine." "I do!" he says hastily. "Did I not satisfy you?" "You did!" "Then what do you mean by perfunctory?" "I just—I don't know. Oh, bugger." "I thought you didn't want to. We had curry for dinner." "No, I don't mean—! I'm not only talking about sex." He realises this is true as soon as he says it. "I mean, all of it. Our whole day. Doesn't it feel like every day is the same? We get up, have breakfast, I go to work, you work on youe projects, we come home. On Saturdays we go out for dinner and and shag, on Sundays we visit the Potters, and on Wednesdays we get takeaway as a mid-week pick-me-up and shag." Sirius nods slowly. "Yes. Sounds like a great life to me." "It is!" Remus says, nodding too enthusiastically. "Really! I only wonder…" His stomach clenches. Sirius is watching him carefully; Remus can practically see the cogs turning in his head. No deflecting now. He's in too deep. Better to just be honest. "Just, it feels a bit like we're going through the motions. Sometimes." His husband watches him through narrowed eyes. Slowly, he takes off his reading glasses and sets them down on the magazine. "Moony. Are you having a midlife crisis?"

Remus blinks in surprise. "You know what, I think I am."

Maybe time isn’t a flat circle. Maybe we’re not just repeating history, spinning around over and over again, life after life, ad infinitum, ad nauseum, amen. Maybe time is more like a vinyl record, where each pass under the needle wears the grooves a little more, distorts the sound a little further, so that it starts to skip, so that on the next turn around, you wonder what’s missing, and where those missing parts went. Maybe those little skipped notes, those little pockets of silence, of something lost, scattered into the ether, turn into bigger pockets of silence, until the record is more skipped notes than sound, until it stops turning altogether. Maybe that’s how a universe ends. Maybe that’s how a new one is born. 

"Fore!" The golf ball arcs through the air, disappearing into the afternoon sunlight for a tick before hurling right into one of the zombie sheep. It goes down with a mehhh—thunk. None of the other infected sheep writhing around it seem to even notice. "Head shot!" James whoops. "Five points. That brings us up to—what—fifteen to seven?" "Yeah, yeah, just you wait," Sirius grumbles, setting a ball on the balcony in front of him and lining up his club. "Fore!" He takes a slow breath, swings, and sends the ball hurtling through the air. After a beat, one of the sheep at the centre of the flock goes down. "That was in the neck, I think!" Sirius says, pointing at the flock. "Nah, that was its side." "You need your glasses checked, Potter! That was definitely in the neck! Three for me!" Probably without even realising it, James pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose. "Pfft, fine, if it makes you feel better. I'm still winning." "For now," Sirius mutters darkly. He glances sidelong at James, and the twat sniggers. Sirius tosses his wind-blown hair out of his eyes with a haughty sniff. Although he won't admit to it, he's happy James found him on the tower ledge. In the middle of one of "fits of the sullens" as James so annoyingly likes to call it, which always makes Sirius want to lob him. It makes James sound like his gran, and Sirius, like a moody child. But of course—and again, he'll never admit to it, and James wouldn't expect him to—he hadn't been entirely wrong. A gloomy, restless mood had overcome Sirius after lunch, though he couldn't quite put a finger on why. But of course, that's not true. He knows why, and he just doesn't want to admit it. The mood had started when Remus and Marlene had walked into the Great Hall together, looking all cosy and familiar. Him, with his head ducked to listen to her, and her, smiling up at him. Apparently, they'd been having a swotty date in the library. Sirius couldn't much stand the library himself. Too musty, too many rules, too much oppressive quiet. Apparently, the library is somewhere Lupin likes to be. With Marlene. A real pair, the two of them. Whatever. None of his concern.

• A Song For the End of the World chapter 39
• ASFTEOTW B-Side: Hell Sheep
• Louvre Heist
• To Build a Home (Toronto AU summer special)
• skipped notes