time has come again [sam]

october 4th, 2002

For anybody else, Charlie would have struggled to leave the house so soon after getting back on English soil - but he'd promised Sam, as soon as he was unpacked and settled, he'd make the trip to Dublin for a proper debrief.

Charlie and Kate had finally moved into the Maida Vale townhouse they'd purchased before the wedding. It had needed some major renovations – and some minor ones too – but it was now liveable: all the plumbing worked, they had a functioning kitchen, and their furniture had been moved in while they were away. The painting and decorating would be a project for them over the next few months; something to occupy himself with now that touring was over. He had a few notes scribbled for new material, but he didn't want to dive straight back into the studio – he hoped that Sam and Liam didn’t want to either.

So they had unpacked, spent a day or two getting accustomed to their new home, Charlie had had that interview booked with the Prophet, then Kate's birthday yesterday (a low key affair after spending a month practically moulded to one another), and then Sam had been the first social call he'd made. His honeymoon being the reason he hadn't been around for Sam during all of this was adding an unnecessary layer of guilt to the whole thing. Charlie had had his fair share of breakups, but – generally speaking – he’d always managed to move on pretty quickly, distract himself. Sam wasn’t like that and Charlie knew it. In fact, when Sam had called, Charlie had thought it was going to be a ‘Surprise! We’re engaged!’ sort of conversation.

Charlie arrived into Dublin via portkey – he wanted to avoid any press, and he was sure so did Sam; they’d both featured in the Prophet in the same week. Charlie, at least, had been a willing (sort of) volunteer. He shoved his hands in his pockets as he walked to Eblana Lane. He’d been before, more than a few times. He liked the Irish wizarding precinct – it was a nice medium between Diagon Alley and Hogsmeade, the best bits of both in his eyes; no students (during term time, anyway) but not as big or busy as Diagon. He found the familiar alleyway – upon first glance it seemed an impossibly small a gap to fit down, but much like Platform 9¾ it was a test of faith. He emerged at the other end into the Lane, right beside The Queen Maeve. The Irish pub looked exactly how a pub ought to, in Charlie’s opinion. It had dark green walls, deep mahogany furniture, and a bar full of brassy taps. The fireplace was roaring when Charlie stepped inside, despite it only being early October. He immediately shed out of his jacket to reveal a plain cotton t-shirt (and mildly sunburnt arms) underneath, glancing around the room for Sam.

His bandmate was in a booth near the windows, had obviously spotted him walk past as he was already halfway to his feet. As Charlie drew near he pulled Sam into a firm hug, patting him on the back. “Alright, mate?” He pulled back after a minute, purposefully trying not to look at him with a pitiful expression. “The usual?” Charlie asked, not waiting for a response before dropping his jacket on the seat and nipping to the bar. He returned with two whiskeys, setting Sam’s (a generous double) down in front of him and sliding into the opposite side of the booth.

An awkward silence descended over them for a brief moment as Charlie tried to gauge whether he ought to ask; Charlie hadn’t had to be there for Sam in this capacity often. Charlie’s solution had usually been to get drunk and go out, but Sam had long-term girlfriends, and, if Charlie thought back that far, the last one had drained the fun out of him for a good few months afterwards. Besides, they were getting a bit old for all of that now, weren’t they? And, well, Charlie had a wife now. Ditching Sam midway through a night on the town had been a bit of a dick move before, but if he did that now he might lose everything.

“Sorry about Jeanne, mate.” He wet his lips. “Was it…” he didn’t want to ask who dumped who but he kind of needed to know if slagging her off was an option to make Sam feel better. “What happened?” he lifted his glass to his lips.

@Sam Lynch

Sam had waffled— that was the only word for it— for hours, after he’d waved his girlfriend (ex-girlfriend) off at the Portkey station. It was Charlie’s honeymoon— nobody wanted their miserable mate calling up on their honeymoon to bitch about ending his relationship. But at the same time, Sam was no idiot. Charlie would hear sooner or later, and better to hear it from Sam himself than from anybody else. God forbid, the press, but Sam didn’t want Liam telling Charlie, either.

In the end, he’d made the call— had waited ‘til it was some ungodly hour, in Mexico, in the sad hopes that it’d go to voicemail and he wouldn’t have to really talk about it, but he needn’t have worried anyway. It’d been quick, since it’d been 2 am, and had consisted mostly of “Me and Jeanne broke it off” and “No, go back to sleep— you’ll be back soon, anyway, right?” and “Yeah, yeah— I’ll call you again. Sorry again.”

He had walked to the bar, from his flat, sticking as best he could to Muggle-y streets. He was trying to stay unrecognised, and had taken the additional precautions of wearing sunglasses and a godawful hat. (Which had worked. Nobody expected to see Sam Lynch going down the street in a bucket hat.) Then he'd taken the precaution of showing up a few minutes early, so that he had time to get rid of both glasses and hat before Charlie got here, tucked the glasses into his shirt pocket and rolled the hat into his back pocket. Waved at the bartender and sat down to wait.

Sam never waited long for Charlie; after a bit, he saw his friend walking past the bar; as the bell over the door tinkled he moved quickly to meet him. “Mate,” he said in greeting, then “Yeah, yeah.” He sat down again as Charlie went for drinks, and adjusted the godawful hat in his back pocket, so sitting on it was a little less weird.

He gave Charlie’s drink a skeptical look— at the wedding, yes, obviously, and then at the bachelor party he’d figured that Charlie had therapist permission or whatever— special circumstances, all that. But this seemed like something shrink wouldn’t have approved. Before he could ask about it, though, Charlie asked about Jeanne.

Sam appreciated vastly that his friend wasn’t being too sappy— it gave him whatever mojo he needed to be as casual as he would like to be. “She got a job offer,” he said, simply. “Peru, you know, something pretty… prestigious, I dunno. You know— she loves her work.”

He scratched at the side of his nose, trying to think of something else to say. “Saw your interview, by the way.” His brother had knocked on his door way too early to make Sam read it (and to laugh at the article, a page or so down, about Sam himself). He didn’t know what to say about it, though, so he settled for “Pretty good job, fielding some of those.” It was nothing unusual for a Banshee interview to make its way, eventually, to Charlie’s romantic life (or Sam’s, or Liam’s, but theirs were far less interesting— at least Sam thought so).

The whiskey slid down Charlie’s throat smoothly, warming him from the inside out pleasantly – he’d had enough tequila over the last month to see him through until at least Christmas, so this was more familiar territory. He lowered the glass back to the table between them and his eyes met Sam’s. Charlie was determined to give his oldest friend his undivided attention, unlike when he’d received the news initially; he’d been enjoying his honeymoon – Sam had presumed the thick tone of Charlie’s voice had been from being woken up, and Charlie had allowed him to live under that illusion, given the circumstances – he had only answered because it was Sam, and Sam wouldn’t have called if it wasn’t important.

Charlie could give or take Jeanne, she was a nice enough girl—woman— nothing special in his eyes, but he knew Sam had been happy with her and Charlie wanted Sam to be happy. Their phone call hadn’t lasted long enough for Charlie to discern how or why it had ended, but even as distracted as he’d been he’d recognised the morose tone down the line. Sam wasn’t happy now and Charlie felt guilty that he’d been on cloud nine for the past few months while Sam had been barrelling towards a breakup. Out of the two of them, Sam certainly deserved happiness far more than Charlie did.

His brow furrowed lightly in response to the way Sam was looking at his drink. Was he expecting a Mai Tai, complete with sparkler and little paper umbrella? He knew he was sunburnt to shit, and Charlie would admit he’d had more than one of the resort classics during his stay in Ixtapa, but he’d missed drinking something that didn’t make him feel like his teeth were rotting from sugar overload  as he drank it – the only reason he hadn’t asked for ginger ale with his drink this afternoon. He was on a detox. A sugar one, mind you, not alcohol.

“A job?” His frown deepened. He couldn’t imagine Kate leaving him for a job, or vice-versa. Charlie knew now that he would serve fries at McDonalds if it meant staying with Kate. “So… she…?” He didn’t want to say ‘dump you’, because he felt like that would be rubbing salt in the wound, and looking at Sam, Charlie could tell the man across from him wasn’t okay with being newly single. “She knew the tour was over, did you not want to go with her?” he asked, revealing a newfound maturity he hadn’t known had been in there somewhere. The idea that Sam’s lovelife could come before the need for more music, more tours, more money, was a strange and foreign concept. Perhaps it was Charlie’s own desire not to have to dive right back into the mayhem that came with it all. It would be easier if he wasn’t the only one holding everyone up. “I mean,” he cleared his throat, “I’d miss the hell out of ya,” he smirked, “but if it was what you wanted, we could make it work.” Selfishly, he hoped it wasn’t what Sam wanted. He wanted Sam to stay right here, and continue to be the voice of reason – the voice he needed now more than ever.

“Ugh, Christ.” Charlie rubbed his palm over his face before resting his elbow on the table, propping his jaw up with his hand. “I blame it on post-wedding… whatever, accepting that interview.” He said, thinking about how women harped on about ‘baby brain’ when they were pregnant. It was only after he said it he realised he was getting awfully close to sounding like a lovesick puppy. “Head clearly wasn’t on straight when I said yes,” he joked, taking a sip of his whiskey. “I can’t believe they brought up Honey,” he said with a groan. “And Fflur.” He scoffed, as if the idea that he and @Fflur Blevins could ever have been a thing was ludicrous, let alone her be one of his muses. Charlie promptly busied himself with swirling the ice in his glass around, knowing full well that Sam probably had his suspicions about a track or two from the last record.  “So how many knickers have you got, then?” he grinned, trying to distract Sam before he was allowed to think too much about it.

Sam glanced up from Charlie’s drink at the question, taken aback by the question. Of course, he’d thought about going with her— and Charlie was right, their tour had been over— did Charlie expect Sam to have given up the band for love?

He had loved Jeanne, of course. He knew that. Charlie, he thought, also knew that. But Sam hadn’t ever thought about dumping the band with any sincerity— even his musings on giving it up hadn’t lasted long, the same way he knew hers hadn’t. But now he was just sitting, like an idiot, without answering the question; “Er,” he said. He’d sort of wanted to go with her, but he hadn’t wanted it enough, which he’d feel cruel saying out loud. “I mean, we talked a lot about it. You know— I love our job, too.” Hopefully that wasn’t too sappy; just in case it was, he added “Couldn’t put you on the drums, could we? Pretty face like that, all the way in the back.”

Charlie smirked, probably sensing Sam’s need for a little levity, and Sam seized on it gratefully. “Couldn’t do that much Portkey travel,” he said, grinning back. “Time difference alone would kill it— don’t reckon they’d want to keep the studio open for us at three a.m. or whenever. Sorry about the call, by the way— wasn’t totally clear on time differences.”

He was right about one thing— the interview had been stupid to take, though less for the reasons Charlie seemed to be thinking. Sam and Liam, after the Piper Morel interview that had printed things he’d said off record, had stopped leaving Charlie alone for press things, which was probably a good policy anyway. Charlie was good with words sometimes, but never seemed to retain that skill during interviews. “Right after your wedding,” he said, sympathetically. “You know reporters, though. Kate doing alright with it?”

Charlie seemed eager to change the subject from Honey and Fflur, both of whom Sam suspected had been musical influences in their last album; he snorted and took a quick swig of his drink. “Not that I know of,” he said. “Stopped checking my mail, which I’d have told ‘em if they asked. Don’t know what the Daily Prophet knows about celebrity— you reckon they get pants in the mail?”

As he took another drink, Sam gave Charlie’s own another look before he bit the Bludger and asked: “Your, eh— your shrink know you’re… you know?”

The therapist was something that had been disclosed privately to the band, though Charlie had been tight-lipped about whatever it was about. Sam wasn’t stupid, though— he knew Charlie had his problems with alcohol, and he knew Kate had her problems with Charlie’s problems with alcohol. Didn’t take a genius.

Charlie nodded pensively – he understood exactly what Sam was trying to say; he loved their job too. He’d occasionally found himself daydreaming about what on earth he’d be doing right now if they hadn’t gotten their break, and usually it was nothing beyond working in a bar, as he had done when they’d first started out, though he had once mused that he’d quit magical society altogether and get a trade if it had all fallen through. He figured he could make a half decent mechanic if he put his mind to it. Fortunately, they were well placed to never have to get real jobs. He grinned and rolled his eyes. “Please,” he said, “you’re only back there so Liam and me have got half a chance.”

“Yeah, I can tell you now I’m already sick of it and I’ve still got Thanksgiving and Christmas to look forward to,” he rubbed at his face and then winced, having briefly forgotten about his sunburn. Maybe that was part of what was giving him a sour taste about the continent-hopping too. Charlie glanced at Sam and shook his head, “Don’t worry about it, wasn’t asleep—“ he shut himself up abruptly and lifted his drink to his lips, hoping Sam would miss that.

“Erm, yeah, think so.” He rubbed at the back of his neck gently, his other hand still gripping his glass of whiskey like a lifeline. “She let me out the house, anyway,” he smirked, though it wasn’t with the same conviction he usually mustered when joking about that sort of thing. He assumed Kate was fine, but they hadn’t really delved into it. Too busy trying to stay on cloud nine, he supposed. “It’s either gonna get worse or better,” he said solemnly, referring to the fact that Kate was no longer his girlfriend, but now his wife; she wasn’t so easily ignored or brushed aside as she might’ve been before. He hoped the tabloids, and the fans, would be kinder now, but he wasn’t holding his breath.

“Dunno,” he shrugged, glad for the change of topic – if only slightly. “Can’t say I get knickers, or maybe I do but Kate’s told the label to bin them.” He took another sip of his drink, clearly deep in thought. “Bit grotty, really, ain’t it? Imagine sending your dirty kecks to a bird.”

His grin faded and he looked from Sam’s face to where Sam was looking (his drink), then back to Sam again. “What?” he blinked. Then the penny dropped – Sam thought he was in therapy for drinking. “Oh,” he loosened his grip on his glass and used his fingertips to spin it slowly on the table. He wet his lips and sighed softly. “It’s erm,” he sat back in his seat, finally looking Sam in the eye, “it’s not for booze. The shrink.” He said quietly, aware that at this time of day the pub was relatively empty and therefore their voices would carry a lot further. His cheeks grew warmer and he glanced away, drawing his hands back and under the table.

Charlie knew if he was going to tell anyone – anyone other than Kate – that Sam would be the one to tell. He’d known him the longest; Sam knew the worst of him, and was still hanging around despite it all. He chewed on his lip for a moment before meeting Sam’s eyes again. “It’s for the cheating,” he admitted almost inaudibly; he’d let Sam figure out exactly what that meant. Didn’t take a genius.

Sam rolled his eyes. He had gotten a lot more used to praise, now that he was famous, but it always felt a little different coming from Charlie. Less sincere and more meaningful. (And Charlie, he thought, was right— though Charlie got the attention for being frontman, generally Sam got the attention for being good-looking. Relatively good-looking, for their band, at least.) He rubbed the back of his neck and bounced his knee and took another sip of whiskey, nodded along as Charlie started to go on about the Portkey trips, and the time difference.

He cut himself off snappish at the tidbit about his not being asleep; Sam raised his eyebrows, catching the slip for what it was. (It’d been Charlie’s honeymoon, he remembered. Oops.) “Well, I feel worse now,” he said, grinning in case Charlie thought he meant it. “Hope Kate wasn’t mad.”

Kate must have been having such a month, between her honeymoon and that article— and, though Charlie had some optimism for the future, Sam couldn’t say he did. A wife was more permanent than a girlfriend, obviously, but no way did that mean that the weirdo fans were going to like her more than they did. Hopefully the sane ones were happy for them, though— Sam wondered what their mail looked like lately. Half congratulations and half crap, he guessed.

“Gross,” he agreed cheerfully.

The look Charlie was giving him, though, wasn’t the look of someone who was feeling guilty or like he’d been clocked, so much as it was the look of someone well and truly baffled at the conclusion Sam had drawn. “Not for booze,” repeated Sam, doubtfully— though he wasn’t going to say so, Charlie seemed a little like he needed to see a therapist for the booze, too, or had in the past. But, no, therapy for cheating did make more sense. “Oh,” he said, keeping his voice low and discreet. “Danny and his ex did couples’ counselling, for a bit, I think.”

This, actually, wasn’t helpful; that it’d been Sam’s brother and Sam’s brother’s ex would already signal that it hadn’t worked, but Sam thought Kate and Charlie would have a better shot at this than Danny and his girl had. (They were both trying, for a start— that was good.) He nodded, lips pressed thinly together— “It’ll be good, I reckon,” he said bracingly, his tone as reassuring as he could make it. “Talk your shit out. Definitely do before you have kids.”

Charlie lowered his drink and allowed himself to grin – seemed like Sam wasn’t as grossed out (or worse, upset) as he thought he might be. “No, she weren’t,” he replied honestly, biting on his lip. He figured that despite Sam not being disgusted by this revelation he wouldn’t push it by supplying him with further details of exactly what had been going on whilst he was finding out Sam was no longer with Jeanne.

“Mm,” his brow furrowed and he took another sip of whiskey, contemplating the thought process, and logistics, behind sending someone your underwear and whether you were meant to have washed them first or not. He was rather glad, upon thinking about it, that he hadn’t received any knickers in the post – and not just because he wouldn’t want to have an argument with Kate about it (it would be his fault, obviously).

Charlie nodded at Sam’s ‘oh’. Then he frowned at the follow-up comment, not filled with confidence – if that was what Sam was trying to fill him with. “Went well, then, did it?” he asked with a raised eyebrow. Good thing it wasn’t exactly couples’ counselling then.

“Cheers, mate,” he said quietly, avoiding eye contact up until Sam mentioned kids. His eyes snapped up to meet Sam's across the table. “What?” Had Kate said something to him? He knew Sam and Kate got on alright – got on really well compared to her relationship with Liam, and not in a way that Charlie ever thought he had to worry about. But he and Kate weren’t – he wasn’t – planning on having kids any time soon, in fact wasn’t even certain he wanted them at all, yet. He knew Kate did, and it felt a little wrong to have married her without really working out what they both wanted – or, rather, what he wanted. Charlie knew Kate wanted kids – ‘a few’, she’d said, when they’d loosely discussed the (far distant, hypothetical) future. Charlie had admitted as much as wanting what Kate wanted, which he knew wasn’t the same as wanting them himself. And how many was ‘a few’, anyway? He hadn’t wanted to ask. He could probably talk her down, right?

“We’re not—there’s no plans for that.” He said, his voice sounding a lot less confident than he would have liked. “That’s not what it’s all for,” he tried to explain, without really explaining anything. He glanced down at his whiskey between them and brought his hand back out from under the table to pick it up, taking a long sip and looking around the room with rounded eyes. Shit. He set the glass back down and missed the card coaster, slamming it with a small clatter against the wood. “They um, it’s a proper thing,“ he said, aware that he was still not really giving Sam much to go on but unwilling to say it outright. But maybe he needed to, to Sam at least. Just Sam.

Charlie sighed, resigned to his fate but unable to look his best friend in the eye. “I’m not just… a shitty person,” he said quietly, his finger playing with the grooves in the wooden tabletop, “they’ve like… diagnosed me and shit.” He looked up finally, hoping Sam wouldn’t laugh at him.

Whoops.

That was his bad, definitely, forgetting that, unlike Sam, Charlie had not grown up taking it for granted that he’d have a family once he got married. Frankly, Sam doubted Charlie’d had marriage on the table until Kate.

“Oh, no, didn’t think there were anything like that happening yet,” said Sam— obviously there had been zero talks about kids, yet— they’d only gotten married like a month ago. “Meant, y’know, distant-future-old sort of thing. You know, better to sort out now than later.” Charlie and Kate were going to have to talk about it someday, anyway; Sam could only hope that, when it inevitably came up, they’d deal with it better than Charlie just had. The bit of him that felt guilty for bringing it up was, for now, much feebler than the rest of him that was glad someone had said so.

“Anyway,” he backtracked, “Lots of couples go up and down before they get settled, it’s a good thing to talk about regardless, I reckon.”

Not that Kate and Charlie really desperately needed the couples’ therapy, of course, but… maybe a little.

Sam scratched his nose as Charlie fumbled on, frowned in concentration. “Mate,” he said, sincerely and earnestly. “I’ve got no idea what you mean. Adultery’s not a mental illness.”

He could appreciate Charlie’s attempts, as shittily as they were going, to really be honest— and it had the awkwardness of being the first time he’d had to really talk it out, so Sam was unfathomably grateful it was with him and not, like, Liam, who— bless him— needed therapy as well and would be no help. “Good luck,” said Sam, rather insufficiently. “I’m sure you’ll do a bang-up job, with...that.”

Sam wasn’t making Charlie feel any better about the prospect of having – or not having – a family. Charlie wasn’t saying never, but he wasn’t overly keen to say eventually either. He’d been avoiding thinking about it almost as much as he’d been avoiding talking about it. “Mm.” Rather than drag this particular conversation out any further, he just nodded and took another, smaller, sip of his whiskey.

“Yeah,” he agreed absently; not that he wasn’t paying attention, more that he was considering Sam’s rather astute assessment. Charlie had always just given up before Kate – nobody else had seemed worth the trouble to change his habits or opinions. He still couldn’t put his finger on what Kate had over him that none of the others had, but there was obviously something.

Sam stared back at him, and Charlie at least felt like the Irishman wasn’t going to laugh at him. What he did say, when he eventually said it, was possibly worse than laughing in Charlie’s delicate state. He frowned. “I don’t mean—” he started to snap in hushed tones, before sighing and rubbing his palm over his face. “Sorry.” He looked around the room quickly then circled his attention back to Sam. “I’m not,” he sighed heavily again. Christ this was horrible. “I’m not… addicted to cheating,” he said finally, almost stumbling over the ‘A’ word. 

Sam was still staring at him, lost. Charlie was getting frustrated – not just at Sam, but at himself, at the situation, all of it. “Sex,” he said, perhaps a little loudly, then promptly lifted his glass to his lips and drained the rest of the liquid, flustered. It had never been awkward talking about sex with Sam – or Liam – but this was. This was excruciating – mostly because who the fuck was addicted to sex? It sounded like a made-up excuse. If he hadn’t been to a proper therapist he’d have called bullshit.

He shot Sam a dark look, not sure if his friend was being sincere or sarcastic. “Just don’t tell Liam, alright?” Not yet, anyway. Charlie wasn’t entirely confident that Sam was being supportive (he wasn’t exactly being unsupportive, either, yet, he supposed), but Liam… Not only would the third member of their three-piece likely find the whole thing hilarious (it wasn’t), he might even see it as some sort of challenge, a good way to get his Charlie back. There’d been a reason Charlie had opted out of their usual post-gig nights out this tour, and he didn’t need temptation.

This was a man who did not want to talk about the hypothetical having or having-not of children, so Sam clammed up about it. It did seem awkward anyway, to talk about this with your mates. Sam didn’t tell his mates that he wanted kids.

Silence was sometimes a good policy; even though his obstinate lack of understanding seemed to be frustrating Charlie a little— unintentionally, even, Sam just plain didn’t get it— he wasn’t going to talk his way into a worse offense. Not when it was so much easier to sit looking like a tool.

“Oh, sex,” he said. He let that sit awkwardly between them for a second and thought, for as brief a moment as he could, about sex. Yeah, he decided, after a second. It was at least chemical, that much was true. And Sam couldn’t say he thought he, personally, could get hooked on the sensation, but he knew that was how he’d always felt about getting wasted. “Yeah,” he said, decision made. “It’s like, chemical. Makes sense.”

Charlie’s next request was that he not tell Liam, but even if Sam didn’t live his life wanting to hear those three lovely words— Don’t tell Liam— he’d have kept his mouth shut about it. Seemed a little personal, even for them. Besides, Liam hadn’t been sold on the therapy from the start, much less this therapy, once he found out it was about having less sex.

It explained a lot, though. The cheating, obviously, especially the cheating from after Charlie and Kate had been serious. The girls in general. And if Sam was honest, he’d already known, in less concrete terms, that Charlie could resist things a lot less than Sam could. Frankly, it was almost reassuring that he could now put it off to this— whatever— of Charlie’s. Sam was much, much happier feeling sorry for his friend than feeling self-congratulatory. He was a rockstar, but that didn’t mean he had to be a prick. Though, of course, if he let himself think so, he knew whose mind worked like that.

He coughed and finished his whiskey. “Well,” he said, trying to sound casual, “Don’t worry, safe with me.” This had gotten weird— which was his fault, for bringing up the shrink— and he was eager, now, for it to become not. He swilled his ice around; they hadn’t seen each other since the wedding, surely there was something else to talk about. Anything apolitical.

“You’re setting up the house, right?” he said. “Kate letting you make us a band room?”

Charlie’s cheeks were flushed pink despite himself, and he was avoiding looking Sam in the eye. He wanted to get another drink, but now seemed like a poor time to just get up and leave the table. He glanced at Sam cautiously and was rewarded with his friend looking just as uncomfortable – that was better than the alternative. “Yeah,” he cleared his throat, “chemicals.”

“Thanks, mate,” he said quietly, tilting his empty glass as if to try and balance it on its edge.

Sam really was the best friend ever, wasn’t he? If he was judging Charlie right now he was keeping it to himself – just like he always had. Was there a better kind of friend? Sam had stepped on Charlie’s toes once or twice – telling Kate about past indiscretions had not gone down well with Charlie, but Sam was also a bigger man than Charlie (in more than one way), so they’d just sort of sulked about it for a couple of weeks before resuming normal programming – but it had always been in his best interests, really. Never malicious.

“Pff, letting me,” he scoffed. “I told her I wasn’t getting a fucking townhouse unless I could have one,” he clarified. He’d said it a lot nicer to Kate, of course, but Sam didn’t need to know that. The sentiment had been the same: he saw no issue with the apartment he'd lived in before, but he understood the security issues it now posed that it had been broken into – he also wasn't sad about cutting ties with the place that had been the scene of so much drama, wife, ex-girlfriends and ex-lovers included. He knew Kate was upsizing with their future in mind, and Charlie had tried to fight it for a while until she'd cleverly pointed out the potential for a rehearsal space if they got a place big enough. “Basement’s pretty much mine,” he expanded, “garage, gym, music room. Guess she might use the gym but yeah,” he grinned, already a little more at ease with the idea of The Townhouse now that he was talking about it with Sam.

“I’ll buy a kit,” he said, “so you don’t have to cart yours in and out every time we wanna jam.” Plus, Charlie had always wanted his own. He was nowhere near as good a drummer as Sam, but he could drum. Simple rhythms, nothing complicated. And he really wanted like, a full setup. He’d have his own guitars, obviously, maybe buy like one bass to keep in there just for those impromptu sessions. He’d love a piano, but he supposed a keyboard would do the job. He hadn’t really delved too far into planning it yet because there was still so much to do everywhere else. He wanted to do it properly, when the time came.

“We’ve been focusing on the bedrooms and stuff, Kate’s family are supposed to be coming here this Christmas so we need to get it ready. But I’ll get it sorted in the New Year, definitely.” He kind of liked the idea of putting off band commitments until then anyway – time to relax, reset. “You’ll have to come ‘round and see it, before then, obviously. It's like, pissing distance from Abbey Road,” he grinned, clearly very happy about this.

By far this was the weirdest conversation Sam could remember having with Charlie lately (and they’d had a few truly awful ones.) His friend was focusing more on his glass, which was something of a relief. Ironic, that, since he’d gotten here pretty well convinced that Charlie was an alcoholic. He tapped his own glass with one fingernail, nodded in the most here for you, mate, but let’s change the subject way he could think of, lips pressed uncomfortably together.

Now he’d run out of liquor he was getting restless; he drummed his fingertips on their table and grinned. There was next to no way that Charlie’d been quite this adamant about the band room— at least not in these words— but Charlie was so sunburnt he looked like a lobster. It’d be honestly cruel to rib him over his wife too.

“Glad she’s being so generous,” he said, anyway, and grinned. “Keeping the bike, then, are you? Good show.” They’d both finished their drinks, and Sam sort of wanted another; he scratched the back of his neck and glanced out the window at the street, then dragged his gaze back in surprise: “Oh, alright.”

That was a lot more thrilling than he really wanted to admit— but God, he was excited for the band room, whenever it got made. And the next album, whenever it got made. He imagined it for a moment— they’d need to keep an icebox, for beer, and Charlie would have a drum kit, so Sam didn’t have to Floo his over, or Apparate it piece by piece— that’d been sort of touching, even. Thanks, Kate!

“You’ve got all the in-laws over, then? How many are there?” From what he remembered, Kate’s family had been pretty large, even by Sam’s standards (Sam and his thirty cousins.) He didn’t envy Charlie at all— he had enough trouble when a couple of his aunts came over for an afternoon, much less for an extended stay. And they were his actual aunts, not his aunt-in-laws. “Abbey Road!” he echoed, and grinned— “I’ll have to drop by, then. Bring you some housewarming shit. I’ve got this vase my mam gave me that I’m dying to get rid of, Kate might like it.”

He swilled his melty ice around his cup and added, “Glad you’re back home, though. It’s been boring.” This was stretching the truth— if Sam had wanted to be kept busy, he’d have found ways. He’d just been mutually broken up; once they’d all recovered from the travelling, he honestly couldn’t wait to be kept busy with the band again.

Charlie shot Sam a look that said 'watch it' and broke out into a grin. "Yeah, you think I'd get rid of it?" he rolled his eyes. "I'm married, not mental."

As if the barman could read minds (or just wanted to make money where he could), he approached with two fresh glasses with a double for each of them. Charlie nodded a "Cheers," and gratefully plucked the glass from him before he'd set it down on the table, almost downing the whole thing in one quick swoop. "Can you bring another round, mate?" he asked, before their host turned away with their empty glasses.

Sam didn't sound particularly thrilled -- or, not as thrilled as Charlie had anticipated. "I just thought it'd be easier, you know, all those times you were over for a beer and we had an idea and then-- your kit were at home, you know?" He explained, wary of his personal (to be shared) rehearsal space sounding like yet another way of controlling the band. Sam hadn't said anything of the sort aloud, in front of Charlie, but Charlie wasn't so naive as to assume Liam was alone in thinking Kate-as-manager was Charlie's way of getting, well, his way. It hadn't been, despite the way it looked. Well, it had been his way of giving Kate an excuse to move to London, and to help her out (and win her over) by giving her her dream job.

"Yeah," he groaned, finishing the sliver of amber liquid he'd left in his tumbler. "Fuck, I don't even know, I lost count." Kate's definition of 'family' was a lot more inclusive than Charlie's. Even Sam, who had a large family, probably couldn't hold a candle to Kate's. The way she'd described it, Charlie felt like he was now related to half of Mexico.

"Thankfully it's just her parents, sister, and her abu-- Ab-- grandmother." He'd been brushing up on his Spanish but he was still more comfortable listening than speaking, and he didn't need to give Sam and Liam more excuses to take the piss out of him -- comedy accent Yorkshire Spanglish included.  "I'm sure the rest of them are cursing me for not extending the invitation but I'm not having a whole horde of people I don't know in my house for a week, even if I could fit 'em," he said. Admittedly, he could, theoretically, get to know them -- but then he'd lose his excuse and he was clinging onto any semblance of authority about his household and personal space tooth and nail.

Charlie's leg was bouncing under the table now; he was getting anxious just thinking about Tony Duenas coming to stay -- it had always been the other way around -- and both their next round of drinks and a (slight) change in conversation arrived in time to distract him. "Yeah, and there's an alright pub just down the road," he said, as if it was novel for there to be a pub within walking distance anywhere in London. Charlie gave Sam a wary look, "If it's so nice why're you trying to offload it?" He took a sip from his new drink, "Sure your mum won't notice it's missing?"

A shifty grin spread across Charlie's lips. "Boring? Liam not taken you out to get over--" he nodded his head in the general direction of what was supposed to be Brazil, or Chile, or wherever it was, "-- yet?" He shook his head dramatically, "Have to get you out, mate." Charlie rolled his lips, "Reckon Kate won't mind if I'm back late tonight, if you're up for it?"

I’m married, not mental.

Sam rather thought it was the same thing— Charlie lived in a townhouse now, after all— but he shrugged, rather than get into it. The other drum kit was a more pressing concern than Charlie’s bike, anyway— Sam let himself think about that for a moment. As much as he was a little loath to use somebody else’s kit he knew Charlie was right— it was a lot better than Apparating one of Sam’s, or trying to stuff it through the fireplace. Would a basement even have a fireplace?

And he couldn’t wait to get back into writing music— the good days, beery and a little belligerent, bickering about the beats or the bassline or the bridge— soon enough they’d get back into that. It was a process so much more rewarding than touring, to Sam; he reckoned the others felt the same way, although he was loath to ask ‘em about it. It was a sort of sappy question, he figured. The tours, by all rights, should have been more fun— the girls, and the drinking, all of it.

He let a tad more enthusiasm bleed into his voice— “No, right— that’s smart. Saves me the trouble of just hitting the table, don’t it?” Leaning back in the booth, he got his new glass and took a quick drink. “Reckon that’s like, got some charm in it, though, the table sound. Sometime we gotta put that in an album. Part o’ the Banshee experience, like.”

Sam wasn’t any stranger to a large family; he grinned. “Don’t envy you, mate. Or Kate.” He grinned a little more broadly at Charlie’s hastily caught Spanish, now more than a little curious if Charlie, like, used it. (And what the Duenas clan thought of it. It couldn’t be that good— Sam had heard Charlie speak French.)

He finished his drink. “That’s the right choice, mate,” he added. “I know all my relatives and it’s hell.”

He nodded gratefully at the barman, pushed his empty glass at him to take— “Oh, a pub,” he said, with no little amusement. (Imagine that, a pub.) Then: “Well— it isn’t my thing, I’m not an art person, am I?”

Then, “Well, not that sort of art person.”

The next comment gave him more pause— “Right, hadn’t really thought of that. I guess I can just stick it in the guest loo where nobody has to see it.” He’d find some other hideous housewarming gift to foist on Charlie; it wasn’t particularly fair to Kate, he knew, but given the choice between taking the piss out of Charlie and being considerate to Kate’s new townhouse, he was going to take the piss.

“Oh, not that boring,” he amended quickly— Liam had been a brick these last few weeks— “I coulda been less bored if I tried, touring just burnt me out. Reckon we’re getting old.”

Charlie invited him out; Sam thought it over— his cousin Lisa had a baby shower tomorrow but it was in the afternoon— and said, “You’re sure Kate won’t mind? You’ve only been back over here for what, a day? Two?” Then: “Yeah, I’ll go out! Don’t have to be up too early.”

[out]

Sam appeared to be thinking over the suggestion, slowly making his way towards being okay with the idea. Charlie nodded enthusiastically, to try and make up for Sam’s lack of. “Yeah, and you can like, help me pick it all out or whatever,” he offered, realising in the same moment that he said it that it might not be a bad idea to involve Sam in the purchase – he’d probably use it more than Charlie would – once the novelty wore off – and definitely knew more about the percussion instrument.

Charlie smiled; the expression was a little forced, a little glazed behind the eyes. “Yeah, yeah. Definitely.” It wasn’t a bad idea at all, but Charlie was struggling to come up with anything of his own lately – that he was happy with – so he was keen to leave it at that.

“I dunno how you do it,” he shook his head, eyebrows raised in honest disbelief. He caught Sam’s grin and shrugged into one of his own; he appreciated that the Irishman didn’t ask him to try that again. His grin widened as Sam offered his support. “Sounds it.”

“A pub,” he confirmed, still grinning -- wasn’t much they needed to add to that,was there?

“Neither am I.” Charlie smirked at not that sort. “Yeah,” he pictured this vase (though he had no idea what it looked like) perched on the windowsill above Sam’s loo, “but only the blokes’ll get to admire it there.” Standing and all. He shook his head sympathetically, “Poor Mam.”

Charlie quirked a knowing eyebrow at Sam. “Yeah, tell me about it.” He definitely felt burnt out, but he wasn’t sure whether it was a combination of factors that had led to it, or just one. “Old? You’re the youngest!” He kicked Sam gently under the table because he was unable to shove his shoulder across it. “You’re not old until I say you are.” Mainly because Charlie didn’t want to admit to being old; physically he was definitely feeling a little slower, but mentally he still didn’t feel like he deserved to be called an adult -- even with a wedding band on his finger.

He was half-expecting Sam to decline his offer (as was the usual modus operandi for Samuel Lynch), so Charlie perked up considerably when he actually sounded interested. “Nah mate.” She might mind, but it was Sam. “She’s had me for a month, gotta give her a break or she’ll get sick of me,” he joked, though he had to admit there was a part of him that wondered. “Good,” he grinned, wider, then finished his drink and slammed the glass down on the table. He reached into his back pocket for his wallet. “You’re the local, you can pick the venue --" he looked around shiftily for the barman, " -- gotta be somewhere a bit more lively around here.”


END