It's a very long week later when Newt's pulled out of Percival's guest-room by Pickett tugging on his ear. "What now?" Newt says, feeling faintly exasperated; certainly he was a great help in the rescue, but since then he's been making a nuisance out of himself, taking Newt all over the house and insisting on spending hours watching Percival like he's about to turn into an imposter or disappear. Percival is technically on mandatory recovery leave, but he's had stacks of paperwork and Aurors in and out and Theseus, in meetings about Grindelwald with the ICW, hasn't been around enough to stop him. Newt, helping hide an Obscurial in the Goldstein's apartment and an un-obliviated Muggle on the streets, hasn't particularly wanted to raise any questions and so has been conceding quietly to Pickett's strange whims.

Pickett leads Newt out of the bedroom and down the hall, where Newt hears Theseus's voice from the kitchen. " - should just tell him, Percy, it's not like Newt'll catch on otherwise."

Newt's step forward is halted by Pickett's grip on his ear. Percival's voice says, "I can't just say it - he doesn't - " and Newt tunes him out, something about this feeling all-too familiar. He narrows his eyes at Pickett, who waves his arms and clambers up into Newt's hair.

"Pickett," Newt hisses sharply, and tries to grab him; Pickett climbs over Newt's head and tugs painfully at his hair. Newt tries to soften his tone. "Pickett, you know I won't hurt you, but if you won't tell me what's going on - "

Pickett suddenly jumps and Newt scrambles to catch him; he crawls up Newt's sleeve and Newt shakes his arms, trying to extract him. "Pickett," he says, volume rising, "you're behaving just like Bandit now, I might have to stop indulging your attachment problems - " and as Pickett makes a leap to the side table Newt just manages to catch him - and falls, crashing, through the kitchen door.

Newt can already hear Theseus's choked laugh as he picks himself up. He holds Pickett out between finger and thumb and turns his glare on his brother. "You!" Newt says. "You're the reason he's been acting so strangely. What did you bribe him with?"

"Nothing!" Newt frowns at him, and Theseus relents. "Well, we might have had a chat."

"A chat," Newt says doubtfully, and turns his frown on Pickett. "You need to stop this. Whatever Theseus told you, he's wrong."

"Hey!" Theseus protests. Newt ignores him.

Pickett chitters, and Newt says, "No! No, that's not right at all." Pickett's pose turns slightly regretful, and Newt sighs and lets him clamber onto his wrist. "You behave yourself now, all right?" He climbs up Newt's sleeve and into his pocket, and it's then that Newt realises he's interrupted a - probably private conversation. Percival has his head in his hands. "Ah, I - I'm sorry about that, really. I didn't hear anything, really, I can just go - "

"No," says Theseus, with the air of someone who definitely arranged this terribly coincidental meeting, "we were just talking about you, Newt. Come on, sit down and have some tea."

"Talking about me," Newt says warily, sliding a glance to Percival who is studying his tea like he's looking for his future in the dregs. Newt approaches the table, taking the chair gingerly as the teapot pours him a cup. "Theseus - "

"What were we talking about, Percy?" Theseus asks brightly. Percival makes a quiet, choked sound from behind his teacup. "Right, the first time you two met? Do you remember it, Newt?"

Newt - doesn't think he does, honestly. All the times Theseus has arranged for them to be together, and he can't pinpoint the time he hadn't known Percival, then Graves. Long evenings and shared nights have blurred together in his memory, and Newt wonders if there's a point to all this. "That small magical place you liked?" Newt hazards. "After..."

Theseus's smile gentles a little with the recollection. "After we got back from the war."

That's right. Newt remembers, now, the smoky air, the still-pervasive sense of relief. He was still feeling lost; he'd left all his dragons behind. "But," Newt says, and shakes his head. "I don't understand."

Percival says, "Theseus."

Theseus rises from his chair, the sound of it scraping against the floor loud and jarring against the silence. Newt opens his mouth, closes it as Theseus crosses the room and leaves, the door clicking shut behind him. He doesn't know what to say to break the fragile quiet and Percival sighs, closing his eyes.

"Did I forget something important?" Newt asks, hesitant. Percival's mouth twitches and he shakes his head, his gaze fixed over Newt's shoulder.

"Probably not," Percival says, "for you. You might remember, though, that I approached you first. I bought you a drink." His smile turns self-deprecating, and Newt says, "Oh."

Because he does remember, now.


Someone had said something, American, but Newt, sitting alone in tucked-away booth, was lost in the arithmetic properties of the Undetectable Extension Charm he was researching. He still said, "Oh, thank you," at the drink pressed into his hand. It was the same as the one he'd had earlier. "I'm sorry, but I'm - quite busy right now."

"Extension charms," said the stranger, and Newt glanced up; an Auror, by the looks of it, about Theseus's age. "Are you making a living space?"

"Oh, no," Newt said, "something much more complicated than that." He'd done his research on habitat preservation but that was another thing he'd have to incorporate - climate controls, partitioned. "Well. It's quite niche, really."

"The friend I was meeting is running late," said the other man. "I have time."

So Newt, slowly, started to talk. The stranger was surprisingly good company, clever and better educated than Newt, though unboastful about it; they delved into charms theory and pored over his calculations, discussed all the charms he'd need to interweave to get the habitats he wanted. Newt tried ideas on him and he responded with applications, and he offered some surprising flashes of insight that Newt started working into his spell. Sometime, Newt realised, he'd finished his drink and the stranger had sat down next to him, the press of his thigh a long line against Newt's own; sometime, Newt realised, he'd started to categorise the shades of his rare smiles. "...and it's good to be prepared for any eventuality," Newt finished, his point feeling a little muddled. "Dragons aren't quite as rare as the Ministry likes to pretend, you know."

"I have no doubt," the man said dryly, with a touch of a smile. "But keeping one?"

"Temporarily," Newt corrected, "keeping one temporarily. He worried his lower lip with his teeth, looking down at the sketches filling his notebook next to pages of calculations. "Just in case. I don't really know what I might stumble over."

"I'm sure you'll manage," said the man. He put his hand over Newt's, where he was fiddling with the edge of the page of his notebook, and Newt stopped, glancing at him to realise he was being watched with a startling intensity. Newt ducked his head, face warming. "In fact, if you're available, later..."

The man's attention was caught by the door. He'd been glancing up every time it opened, checking for his friend - "great man, terrible at time management," he'd said - but this time lasted longer than all of the last, and Newt jumped at the distraction, followed his gaze.

"Is that your - oh, Theseus!"

The man went still beside him. "Theseus," he repeated, and Newt waved his hand, smiling as Theseus caught sight of him.

"Yes," Newt said, "my older brother, you know - "

By the time he'd finished saying it, Theseus was already there, his hair mussed and robes slightly askew. "Newt! Oh, Percy, I see you've already met my little brother." There was something odd in his tone, and Newt frowned slightly up at him. "Newt, this is the friend I told you about, the Director at MACUSA, Percival Graves."

"Mr. Graves," Newt said. Hadn't he been closer? When Newt looked at him his back was straight, his expression carefully closed, and the man Newt had been talking to - wasn't gone, exactly, but hiding in the soft corners of his eyes. "It's a pleasure to meet you."

"Mr. Scamander," Graves said. His gaze passed from Newt to Theseus. "I should have known."


Newt remembers. But he's still - he doesn't know what to make of it, with Percival watching him over a tea set and a kitchen table, with the odd curl of confused anticipation in his chest. He says, slowly, "You helped me with my case. I remember."

"Then," Percival says, "perhaps you remember I was also approximately five seconds away from asking you to come home with me."

Newt's brain halts. "I - I'm sorry?"

Percival slides him a glance, the tilt of his mouth amused. "Of course, then Theseus came along, and I realised you were the little brother he'd sworn vengeance for on literally anyone who tried to touch him - "

"He wasn't that bad," Newt protests weakly. He feels strangely warm, and he can't look at Percival's face.

" - so I must admit I thought he was putting me through some sort of trial." Percival taps his fingers on the rim of his cup. "Of course, by the time I realised it was genuine, we'd already come to an accord. And I didn't think... well."

"You don't mean," Newt says, tentative and quietly disbelieving, "all this time..."

"You frustrate me," Percival says, quiet. "You ignore all laws when it suits you, you rush recklessly headlong into danger without any regard for your personal safety if something's hurt or in trouble - the way you treat creatures that could kill you is frankly disturbing - and that's not to mention your disregard for the chaos you leave in your wake. And all this time... yes."

Newt guiltily glances up. Percival's expression is gentle. He reaches out and takes the teacup from Newt's trembling hands and clasps them in his own. He leans forward, meeting Newt's eyes, and Newt feels caught, unable to look away.

"Newt," Percival says, "would you come home with me?"

Newt's heart is pounding, a slow unfurling happiness in the flush of his cheeks and the catch of his breath. He wants to lean forward and close the distance between them, to press Percival down against his mattress until he can only say Newt's name. He wants to fall asleep beside him and wake up there again; he wants to learn the intricacies of his magic and settle creatures in his house and - someone to come home to, Theseus had said, and Newt - Newt wants that, too.

Instead, Newt says, a spark of mischief in his smile, "You do realise that we're already here. At your home."

He leans forward and catches Percival's huff of a laugh between them. Percival's mouth opens under his own but Newt isn't expecting the pull around his waist that sends him stumbling, laughing, into Percival's lap, where Percival winds his hands into Newt's hair and keeps him there. When Newt can catch his breath again Percival's smiling at him. "You know, it can be yours, too."

"Oh," Newt says. There's a giddy sort of delight in his chest, and he can't seem to stop smiling. "Yes. That would be lovely."

They're interrupted by a disgruntled chittering coming from his pocket. Newt squints down as Pickett sticks his head out, and Percival sighs when Newt detaches himself to let Pickett climb up to his hand. "Yes, all right," Newt says to Pickett. "Really? After all this time? Oh, I see." He unbuttons his waistcoat and leaves it over his chair, Pickett safe in a pocket.

"I suppose I'll get used to them," Percival says, and slides his hand under Newt's jaw, drawing him into a kiss. "Will he be all right there?"

"He'll be fine," Newt says. "So, how do you feel about diricawls?"

"In the house?"

"They're very docile," Newt says, cajoling, "if you hand-raise them, they hardly ever knock things over - "

"Newt," Percival says. Newt closes his mouth and glances up at him pleadingly through his eyelashes. Percival sighs. "Diricawls are fine. But - " he starts, before Newt can interject, "Theseus has promised me he won't be back until morning. That means we have the house to ourselves. Do you really want to spend it talking about diricawls?"

"Oh," Newt says. Percival's smile is familiar, fondly amused. "Well, it wouldn't be a complete waste of an evening but - I'm sure we can find something more interesting to do."

Diricawls, Newt's still thinking, a tree for bowtruckles outside the window, his Niffler in a den and maybe a small nest of Ashwinders in the fireplace - and then Percival kisses him, and he can't think of anything else at all.



(Thanks so much for the comments, guys! I have to apologise for this getting so long, it kind of ran away from me! I'll have it up on AO3 in a bit. :))