Leaving Green Sleeves

Chapter one;

Divvying up the loot

September 1st, 1995

The boxes were heavy and unwieldy, but with a wave of a wand they shrank to a more manageable size. The men picked them up and stuffed them all into a leather bag. The dark storeroom was perfectly silent except for their breathing and the sounds of feet shifting on the dirty floor.

"Lumos." For a brief moment, light shone through the darkness and revealed two figures. Pug Pommeroy was the tall, dark-haired one who tried to brush the dust out of his cloak. The bandy legged one with the wand was Mundungus Fletcher - now closely examining the floor before he quickly dispensed of the light. "We're finished," he muttered. "Let's get out."

They moved toward the door where Pug's little brother Tyke stood guard. "It's quiet," he whispered to them, and Dung covered them in a disillusionment charm before they all headed outside and up the street, carefully keeping to the shadows by the wall. Soon they reached the for-once-deserted Diagon Alley, and continued down to the Leaky Cauldron. The inn was sleeping, but the gate to Muggle London was open as it always was at night.

A minute later, they breathed fresh Muggle air again. With a muttered curse, Pug pulled the cloak over his head and tucked it under his arm.

In a poorly lit sidestreet a car was parked, and Tyke took out his keys.

On the way out of London they allowed themselves to relax. "That was easy!" Tyke exclaimed with satisfaction, but Pug, sitting in the seat beside him, growled.

"A bit too easy."

"Come on, Pug! Don't be paranoid, is it really that unbelievable that we actually succeeded with something for once?"

"Don't count your chickens before they hatch," Pug replied, grumpy as always. "As I said, it was too easy, like it was arranged. Why weren't there any guards? Warty hadn't even placed his dogs to look over the goods. I smell something rotten here."

"Everything smells rotten to you," Tyke muttered quietly. He turned the wheel, and the car drove off the motorway and headed towards the rural part of Kent.

"Tyke's right," Dung replied from the back seat. "Warty ain't exactly the sharpest knife in the drawer, if you know what I mean. I scanned the place, didn't I? What did I find? Nothing. When you go looking for something and don't find it, I'd say it's a good chance it's not even there."

"And that's exactly the attitude that's going to get you killed one day."

"Then I want to have Shirley Bassey singing at my funeral. Put on some music."

Tyke put a tape in the cassette player. They drove around on the small roads of the Kent countryside to the tones of Mozart's The Magic Flute, all while the first rays of sun peered over the horizon and painted the sky in pink and purple. All three were quiet as the music and the humming from the motor lulled them into a tired haze.

After another half an hour they reached a small farmhouse near a forest of ash trees. It was an old stone building with clear signs of being left unattended for many years; the windows on the first floor were nothing but empty gaping holes in the facade of the house, and the garden was overgrown with weeds and shrubbery. They parked the car under a mouldy old apple tree, and made their way up a well-trodden path through the nettles to the door. Dung walked a bit after the two others, and when he reached the door Tyke turned to him, looking embarrassed.

"I've mislaid the keys," he muttered while Pug turned his face away, his mouth drawn into a thin line from irritation. "Could you...?"

"No problem. Alohomora."

The door slowly opened, revealing a surprisingly neat room inside - colourful paintings graced the walls and all three of them were careful to brush their shoes off on the doormat. The two squibs and the wizard entered a small kitchen where a black cat greeted them with a soft meow, rubbing itself against Tyke's legs.

Dung sank down in one of the chairs by the table and yawned. "I think I'll sleep a few hours," he muttered and felt how tired he was. "You two don't look much better; maybe we should sleep on this before we do anything else?" He nodded to them, and walked into the tiny living room next to the kitchen and curled up on the tattered sofa with a sigh.

****

It was early afternoon when he woke up from the sounds in the kitchen. There was a warm, heavy sensation weighing down on his hip, and when he turned his head he stared right into the face of the purring cat. It complained loudly as he put it to the floor. "Sorry 'bout that, old boy." Dung turned over on the sofa and looked up at the ceiling and the cobweb in the corners. It always puzzled him how Tyke could be so picky about cleaning and still don't see the cobwebs in the ceiling.

He had a slight headache and only wanted to go back to sleep, but the sounds and voices from the other room didn't stop. He tried his best to ignore it, but a loud thud made him throw the blanket off and get up.

"What're they doing?" he muttered as he gazed at his sleepy face in the mirror on the wall. "Merlin, look at m'eyes..." He stuck out his tongue at the miserable man who peered at him from the mirror; the scum just made a face back at him. He puffed himself up and looked menacing. "Don't try anything funny with me..." he threatened the mirror, but a loud crash from the other room made him jerk and rush for the door.

"You knocking down the walls in here?" he asked from the doorway, and saw Pug and Tyke chasing a little black creature out the front door.

"Look, it's Cinderella!" Pug exclaimed with a sneer. "Doxies in the cupboard. One of them buggers bit me!" He showed Dung his swollen left hand and turned back to Tyke, who was now sweeping out the doxy nest with a worn-out old broom. "I wanted to spray them to kingdom come, but my goof of a brother insists on keeping them alive. Can you please explain to him that they'll just come crawling back in the dead of night if you don't finish them off properly?"

The irritated expression on Tyke's face told Dung to keep out of this discussion. "I don't live here," he muttered, and brought his cloak with him outside. "Got to go see a man 'bout a dog."

After obeying the call of nature, he sat down on the steps to the front door and started cleaning out his pipe. It was a beautiful summer's day, and from where he was sitting he had the perfect view of the countryside before him; the wheat fields rich and heavy with grain, all framed by woodland and green pastures with grassing herds. The air was fresh and carried with it a faint smell of ozone. As he lit the pipe, his eyes fell on the garden and the flowers that grew intertwined with the weeds. Clusters of marigold, camomile, mullein and poppies showed him what the garden had once been back in those days when it was still owned by someone who cared about it.

It was very peaceful, very beautiful, and Dung longed desperately for the crowded and blusterous turbulence of Diagon Alley. There you were lulled to sleep by the raucous songs from the drunkards in the street and woken up the following morning by the town pigeons, coughing on your windowsill from all the fumes from the cars, seeping in from Muggle London. Why had he agreed to come here? Because he owed them, that's why - people could say whatever they wanted, but Dung Fletcher always paid his debts.

And of course because he'd been promised a piece of the pie.

He wasn't sure what the boxes contained, though neither was Pug. He had spoken to Dung about profit and people dealing with goods that had fallen off the back of brooms. The truth was that Warty had somehow rubbed Pug up the wrong way, and Pug wanted his own private little revenge. Dung didn't care; he kept his part of the bargain, and when the brothers had divvied up the loot he would be off back home.

"Hey, Dung!" Tyke stuck his ugly head out the door. "What do you say to a little party, eh? I was off earlier and phoned Sykes; he's rounding up a few people. They're coming in a couple of hours."

Or he could perhaps stay one more day. Maybe watching cows eat was just as soothing as people claimed it to be.

"'Who's coming?"

"The usual suspects; Dan, Trip, Paris and Wilma...Wilma's bringing a bunch of her girlfriends, by the way." Tyke winked at him.

"All right. But maybe we ought to open them boxes - you know, take a peek?"

Tyke waved him off. "Nah. Pug and I decided to do that later, during the party. He wanted to, of course, but I talked him out of it; it's tonight's entertainment!" Grinning, he turned back into the kitchen.

Dung scratched his chin, lit his pipe once more and resumed looking over the landscape. Personally, he would have rehearsed the show at least once before admitting any spectators, but then again, Pug Pommeroy had always had his own way of dealing with things. The fact that he rarely had any success with his deals might have had something to do with that, of course.

He decided to go and wash up by the well. You never knew when a clean face could come in handy, and he'd had some nice experiences with Wilma's friends earlier. Unlike Pug, who loathed water and soap, and then whined on for hours about how shallow women were for not being more perceptive to his advances. Tyke had actually bought him a bottle of after-shave for his birthday only a few months before and Pug had been deeply offended, not talking to his brother for three weeks. Which had proved to be a slight problem since they lived in the same house in the middle of nowhere.

The Pommeroys had a cassette player stashed away somewhere in the living room, and he went to look for it. Tyke was sitting by the table in the kitchen, filling a large bowl with something that was supposed to be punch; after inspecting the brew Dung had to nod in approval. The taste could perhaps have been better balanced, but all guests would be thoroughly plastered by the fifth drink, and that was all that mattered.

"Where's Pug?" he asked when he noticed that the giant was missing.

"He's washing up," Tyke muttered. He had an expression as though he was discussing his brother's serious medical condition.

"What?" Dung peered out the window and saw the hairy brute standing by the pump of the well, shaving off his three-week stubble. "'He's got to be desperate."

****

An hour later they heard the horn of Trip's old Granada. It began as a weak sound in the distance, but grew stronger as the car approached.

"All right, all right," Pug muttered. "We've heard you now, show-off."

Two minutes later the car drove up in front of the old house, the doors opened and a group of cheery people poured out. This car was truly enchanted; no way could twelve people fit inside an ordinary Muggle sedan.

"Were are they all going to sleep?" Tyke muttered worriedly.

"We'll just have to sleep on top of each other," Dung shrugged. "No problem."

Tyke brightened up at the thought. "Wouldn't mind that," he ginned, and sent a broad smile in the direction of a cute read-head.

Dung caught the glimpse of a nice brunette and sneaked inside to put on some fitting music. All the while he heard Paris talking. "Always a pleasure to visit the beautiful countryside! It's so soothing to sit peacefully and watch the grassing herds... My God, Pug, what have you done? Have you shaved...?"

He snickered to himself as he poured himself a drink from the punchbowl. "Didn't know you're a cow-lover, Paris," he muttered and threw the ladle back into the bowl. "Though I reckon you got to be, considering you went off and married one... Posh bastard."

"Dogface!" There was a familiar roar from the door, and two strong arms grabbed him from behind in a bear-like hug that lifted him an inch off the floor. "How's my little friend?"

"Put me down!" He was carefully placed back on his feet, and he turned to look into the friendly face of Sykes Ogden. "'How come all squibs are seven feet tall?" he asked.

"'Cause we ate all our veggies!" the bear exclaimed happily, his breath carrying a heavy odour of gin. "You, my friend, didn't touch a carrot until you were sixteen, and when you did you had no intention of eating it, did you?" He roared with laughter.

Behind him, Dan and Trip came inside, carrying a heavy wooden case between them filled with merrily clinking bottles of Ogden's finest brews. "Such vulgarity," Trip said and shook his head. "If it hadn't been for the fact that you provide us with cheap booze... Hi, Dung. You got any idea what's inside those boxes Tyke was talking about?"

Dung smiled back at his old solicitor. "No. This wasn't very well planned..."

"Of course it wasn't; it's Pug and Tyke we're talking 'bout!" Sykes interrupted him again with his bark-like laugh, and without even bothering to taste the punch he picked out a bottle from the case and emptied it in the bowl. As the youngest son of the Ogden family he had easy access to the products of the family business, and was allowed to do so because of his mother's constant guilt for him being a squib.

Peering through the window, Dung took a closer look at the party on the outside of the house. Paris was still talking with Pug, while Tyke tried to bond with the redhead he'd spotted. She was snickering with her friends, and Dung feared the usual outcome - Tyke hanging over his shoulder the rest of the night, complaining about the girls not liking him. He hoped to Merlin that the youngest Pommeroy would get lucky tonight.

"Look at that little thing," Sykes said and leaned over the kitchen table, with his eyes on the redhead outside. "Nice pair of tits, don't you think?"

"I'm an arse-man myself," Dung muttered.

Trip snorted. "You two bring out the worst in each other."

Sykes gave him a surprised gaze over his shoulder. "Come on, York, don't be priggish; where's the fun in that?"

"You know, Sykes; look at Tyke, he's like a lovesick puppy out there," Dung muttered worriedly. "Couldn't you let him have a go first? I honestly don't want to have him whining on my back for the rest of the night, know what I mean? What 'bout that brunette?"

"Perhaps you should ask the girls first what they want, instead of splitting them up among you like sheep!" Trip barked at them, and slammed the door on his way out.

They stared after him in astonishment. Then Dan cleared his throat, and they turned to find him leaning against the counter while lighting his cigarette. "Matilda threw him out again," he explained in his calm, deep voice and waved his hand casually, dropping ash on the floor. "Be nice to him, all right?"

"Oh." Sykes turned his attention back to the window. "All right, I guess I could let little Tyke have a go if he wants to."

Dung picked up the tape recorder and the tapes, and left the kitchen to join the crowd outside. It was a warm evening and the people had settled in the far end of the garden, near the road, where it was possible to sit without getting stung too badly by the nettles. Another case of bottles was hidden in the shadow beneath the rowan tree, carefully wrapped in a cooling charm placed on it by Wilma.

He looked closer at one of the blondes. She was sitting with her back towards him, and while he still hadn't seen her face she seemed vaguely familiar. Suddenly a chill ran down his spine; it wasn't...it couldn't be...

It was. She turned to him, smiling and happy, and the smile froze to a grimace on her face. "You!" she spat out in a loathing voice.

It was going to be a long night.

*

"You could have told me, you know! But no, you just left me there, didn't you? I waited for you for three hours! People kept looking at me funny, and I felt like I was..."

"Listen, will you? Said I was sorry, all right? An urgent matter came up."

"Oh yeah? More important than me? Do you have any idea how that made me feel? God! If I'd known you'd be here I wouldn't have come."

"If I'd known you'd come I wouldn't have stayed," he muttered. "Listen; I can't tell you anything 'bout it, all right? Beg pardon, but I just...can't." He shrugged and walked over to the punchbowl for another drink, but she followed him.

"It was another woman, wasn't it?"

He turned to stare at her in surprise, and then he laughed and shook his head before he poured the drink down his throat and provided himself with another one. The idea was oddly entertaining - deep down he was flattered by her accusations, but at the same time they angered him. The truth was that he'd been sitting in the bushes outside Privet Drive. He'd covered for Tonks, keeping an eye out for the-boy-who-lived while at the same time trying not to lose his mind, as it had been excruciatingly, gut-wrenchingly boring.

"It was a date, Ramona," he answered dryly. "Not like we were married."

She had followed him all night. The entire time she'd nagged on about the same thing, and he was tired, irritated and fed up. It hadn't taken him long to remember why their week-long relationship had been a mixed pleasure

Out of the corner of his eye he saw Tyke sitting alone by the kitchen table, moping, and he had an idea. He turned to her suddenly, making her jerk as he firmly laid his hands around her waist. She still looked angry, but an expression of uncertainty had turned up in her eyes. He gazed into them and pulled her closer, and her lips parted as she stared into his eyes. Leaning toward her, he muttered softly into her ear: "Could you do me a favour...?"

He heard her swallow, and then her hand slowly, almost shyly, came up to rest on his back. "All right," she answered with a shaky voice before she cocked her head and kissed his throat. The tingling sensation made his will stumble for a second, but he decided the reward wasn't worth the effort.

"You see Tyke over there...?

She hesitated for a second, before she shot a quick glance at the young man in the kitchen. "Yes...?"

"Could you go and fuck him for me?"

She turned rigid as a board before she tilted her head up and gave him an incredulous look, and then she slapped him hard in the face. "Bastard!"

His cheek burned, but he couldn't help but laugh. "I'm sure he'll never leave!" he shouted as she walked out the door and over to her friends outside in the garden. Snickering, he walked over to Tyke, who was playing with his glass. When he sat down the smile disappeared from his face, and he sighed deeply. "I probably am a bastard," he muttered thoughtfully to himself.

"Sometimes I wish I was a homosexual," Tyke interrupted him.

"Don't we all," Dung muttered.

"I think I'll be homosexual for a while," Tyke continued, "just to see if I like it."

"Don't know if that's something you can choose, Tyke. Either you are, or you aren't." Dung turned to him, and rested his arms and head on the tabletop. "You could go with the theory that says we're all bisexual by nature, I suppose. It'd double your chances on Friday nights."

"Yeah, sounds good. Are you bisexual...?" His expression was very serious as his drunken eyes focused and measured Dung with an evaluating look.

Dung snickered into the sleeves of his Muggle shirt. "Tyke, Tyke, Tyke..."

"Dung, Dung, Dung," Tyke replied, and made the other man laugh. "Odd name, though. Where did you pick up that nickname? Threw a lot of dungbombs when you were a lad, or something?"

"Nah, it's m'real name."

"It is? I didn't know...and I've known you for what, ten years? How silly."

Dung laughed so much he got tears in his eyes, and Tyke had started to chuckle as well, his big belly hopping merrily up and down. "You mean, your Mum actually named you Dung? Someone should have reported her to the Ministry. I thought Tyke was bad, but that's just a pet name, so it probably doesn't count."

"It's Mundungus, really," he replied with a voice filled with laughter.

"Like the tobacco?"

"Yeah. My Mum was a tad original, she was."

"So, if I ever get a son I could call him Woodbines? I mean, if I really wanted to? Blimey..." Tyke shook his head, disbelieving.

Pug stuck his head into the kitchen. "Hey, Tyke, maybe we should put up that show of ours. I've told them, and they're waiting...are you crying?" He looked worriedly at Dung, who was wiping the tears from his eyes, and eyed him sceptically when he answered no. "Hmm. Well, come on."

With a sigh Tyke got up from his chair, and together they carried the leather bag out into the garden. Dung followed them slowly. Leaning against the doorframe with the drink in his hand, he observed the brothers talking quietly between each other.

Then Pug clapped his hands, and the small crowd turned silent. "We've invited you all here today to celebrate the victory in the struggle against the foul and stinking scum that bears the name Warty Harris." The crowd cheered and raised their glasses to him.

The shadows beside Dung moved, and he turned to find Ramona standing there. Inwards he groaned, but his outside was as calm as ever. She watched Pug, who was telling the tale of his run-in with the evildoer Warty with much pathos, and then looked up at him with the face of someone who is about to make a great sacrifice. "What you said earlier," she mumbled, almost inaudibly. "You would be there too, right?"

For a second he closed his eyes; she simply didn't get it, did she? He fixed his eyes on the leather bag on the ground between the Pommeroy's, and stated coldly:

"No."

She got that hurt expression on her face again, the one she was so good at, and he felt the pang of guilt hit him hard. He looked at her sloping shoulders as she walked back to her friends, and had to restrain himself not to go after her. But if he did she would never leave; it didn't matter what he did, it would end up with tears anyway. Damn this party, those brothers and those bloody cows that still chewed the same bloody grass they had been chewing since dawn.

"So I'll ask you, Wilma, to wave your wand and open the first one."

Dung found he didn't care very much about the contents of the boxes anymore. He was tired and longed for the privacy of his own flat, to hide away in the darkness in his own bedroom and not give a toss about anyone. The group gathered around the box to see what was inside, but he just turned his head away and looked over the landscape, longing for a pint in the Leaky Cauldron.

He heard a raging roar from the group, and turned his head to see Pug throwing the box into the weeds of the garden, leaving behind it a trail of rubbish and rags. Some of the guests laughed, other simply stared dumbfounded, and suddenly he felt that he'd seen enough. Slowly, he walked back into the kitchen and sat in the darkness with the drink in his hand.

Outside, the crowd dispersed and the doors to the car slammed shut. Soon he heard the engine start up, and after a few friendly but awkward words to the brothers, it rolled down the hillside and away. Tyke showed up in the doorway, looking like he was going to throw up. Nothing new about that, either - in half an hour he would be lying in the overgrown rosebush outside the kitchen window, violently sick. He always did.

Dung looked at his old friend with the feeling of standing outside it all, like he was watching the scene from a window. "What is it 'bout parties that give this heavy feeling of melancholy?" he asked Tyke. "Is it the guests leaving, the music fading out, or is it the knowledge that there's a tomorrow anyway?"

Tyke looked like he's just woken up from a bad dream. "What?" he muttered and suddenly turned a nasty shade of pale. Quickly, he stood up from his chair, almost knocking the table over in the process, and ran for the door.

"Forget it," Dung mumbled to the empty glass in front of him.

In the garden, Pug was busy burning the rubbish-filled boxes. Dung walked out to him, and watched as he threw them into the bonfire, one by one. "Aren't you going to open 'em?" he asked when he saw how Pug mindlessly disposed of them. "There might be something in one of 'em, you know."

"Why?" Pug replied bitterly. "Warty's had the last laugh again, that filthy piece of shit. Why should I humiliate myself even further by going through his wastebasket?" Angrily and without enthusiasm, he tilted another box onto the flames and the fire burned merrily, sending up a cascade of yellow sparks that illuminated the garden.

"Because I know Warty; he's a mean bastard, he is, but not the brightest bastard. Wouldn't surprise me if he'd managed to throw out something useful with the rest."

"Then you do it," Pug replied sharply and went inside the house.

Dung stared after him for a few seconds, before scratching his head and opening the first of the boxes. Nothing useful in there, worn-out rags and ordinary household rubbish, and he involuntarily jerked when his hand touched something soft and furry - a dead rat. Making a face, he kicked the box into the fire.

Box number two didn't held anything of interest either, and Dung started to get tired of the unpleasant work. He sat down and started scraping out his pipe, and lit it before opening the third. He found a foeglass in there. The woodwork was broken but the glass itself was intact.

"This could be worth a bit," he muttered to himself and put it aside, before quickly picking it up again to take a closer look. "Bloody hell," he muttered, and stared into the darkness for a minute. The rest of the box contained nothing of interest, and followed its brothers into the belly of the flames.

In the next he found two silver spoons, and the discovery made him snicker. Definitively an accident, Warty would've been furious if he'd known; he was fond of his silver. He also found a pornographic Muggle magazine, and laid it aside with a grin. He'd show it to Tyke in the morning, then he could decide whether he liked women or not.

In the last box he found some minor objects, among them a tiny necklace shaped like an hourglass. Completely useless, but it was pretty, and he wondered why Warty had thrown it away. Probably his wife's, though - perhaps another accident? He gave the last box over to the merry bonfire on the ground and picked up the treasures he'd found.

Two minutes later the items were spread out on the Pommeroys' kitchen table. Dung looked closer at them while Pug was outside, fishing his little brother out of the rosebush and getting him to bed. "Kids," Pug muttered when he came back, and took a closer look at what Dung had found.

"I want the foeglass," Dung said. "It's been in my hands for half an hour, and has already proved itself useful."

"You saw someone?" Pug watched him curiously.

"It ain't just you Warty would like to lay his hands on," Dung answered with a raised brow.

"Hah!" Pug shook his head slowly and poured another drink. "That one's a mean machine..."

"A meat grinder of a man, he is," Dung replied with a sigh, and waved his hand over the table. "You said I could keep a thing or two, didn't you?"

"I get to keep the silver," Pug replied suspiciously.

"If it hadn't been for me, you wouldn't have any silver," Dung snapped back. "But all right, then I'll take the foeglass. What about this little thing?"

Pug waved his hand dismissing. "Just a trinket," he muttered. "Give it to Kathleen. I think I'll go to sleep now, see you tomorrow."

"Yeah."

Then Dung was alone in the kitchen, cleaning out his pipe once again. He was tired, drunk and irritable, and watched the dottle in the ashtray with a gloomy expression. "What a miserable weekend," he muttered while stuffing his pipe. "Cows, grasshoppers, and Pommeroys. Can't even pee in this place without getting nettles in your boxers..."

He played with the keepsake in his hand. It hadn't been handled too well, he saw that now - ugly scratchmarks on the side of it, and there was a large crack in the glass. To think he'd just given away solid silver for this piece of junk. Angrily, he shook it in his hand and held it up to see if the sand inside was actually moving, and could see tiny grains of sand trickle from one part to the other. If he gave this piece of rubbish to anyone, he'd get another slap in the face. Contrary to popular belief, Dung didn't particularly enjoy being pushed around by ill-tempered women.

He continued to play with it while smoking his pipe, throwing it in the air and trying to do tricks. On two occasions he dropped it and had to crawl under the Pommeroy refrigerator to retrieve it, but strangely enough it didn't break. He was involuntarily impressed by the quality; the maker of this trinket had to be a talented professional. The decor also gave away that fact; a tiny, complicated pattern was engraved in the glass. After a while the juggling became almost obsessive, he tried to throw it as high as he could, and not until the first beams of sun emerged through the kitchen window did he put it down.

With a yawn that made his jaw hurt, he stuffed it inside his pocket and waddled into the living room, where the sofa waited for him.