Chapter 8: Music Taste
The late afternoon sun slanted through the living room window, painting a long, languid rectangle of honeyed light across the faded Persian rug. It caught the dust motes dancing in the air, the lazy curl of steam rising from Remus’s French press, and the silver gleam of Sirius’s tablet as he scowled at a design sketch.
Remus was sprawled in the leather armchair, a hardback biography of Eleanor of Aquitaine open on his lap, his reading glasses perched low on his nose. One socked foot was propped on the coffee table, nudging a precarious stack of student papers. The domestic silence was a living thing, comfortable and warm, punctuated only by the turning of a page or the soft tap of Sirius’s stylus.
Then, a faint, rhythmic thump, a distant whisper of sound, insinuated itself from the direction of Draco’s bedroom down the hall.
Sirius didn’t look up from his tablet. “The prodigy is in his creative vortex,” he murmured, his tongue poking out in concentration as he adjusted a line. “I can feel the angst from here. It’s probably all minor chords and reverb.”
“He said he was working on his line drawings for textiles,” Remus said, not looking up from 12th-century political alliances. “He’s been at it for hours. He gets that single-minded focus from you.”
“Moi? Never. I’m a picture of scattered, flighty exuberance.” Sirius finally set the tablet down with a sigh, stretching his long arms over his head until his shoulders gave a satisfying pop. He listened. The sound was still indistinct, a muted bass line, the ghost of a melody. “It’s the modern equivalent of locking himself in a tower with a lute. Only with more synthetic percussion.”
They lapsed back into quiet. Remus made a note in the margin. Sirius picked up his tablet again, then put it down, restless. The faint music was like an itch he couldn’t quite reach.
Then, abruptly, the sound clarified. The volume increased by several notches, the door to Draco’s room evidently having been opened a crack. A clean, driving guitar riff sliced through the apartment’s calm, followed by a cascade of synth notes and a man’s voice, strained and yearning, singing about jealousy and Vegas.
Sirius froze, his head cocked like a wolf hearing a familiar howl.
“Is that…?” Remus began, peering over his glasses.
“Mr. Brightside,” Sirius breathed, a slow grin spreading across his face. He listened for another few bars, the bounce of the rhythm unmistakable. His foot started tapping of its own accord on the rug. “By The Killers. 2004. A masterpiece of millennial anxiety set to an incredibly danceable beat.”
“I’ll take your word for it,” Remus said, amused, watching his husband’s transformation. The restless artist was gone, replaced by a man experiencing a profound moment of paternal pride.
“He’s listening to The Killers, Moony,” Sirius said, as if announcing the discovery of a new planet. “The Killers. That’s… that’s solid. That’s good, honest, guitar-driven music. A little dramatic, sure, but aren’t we all? I was worried it would be all that glitchy, soulless algorithmic pop, or worse, autotuned mumble-rap about crypto and codeine.”
“A valid concern,” Remus deadpanned, marking his page and closing the book. “The horror of a son with different musical tastes.”
“It’s not different, though! It’s classic! It’s from our era! Well, a bit after our prime, but adjacent!” Sirius was beaming now. He got up, padding barefoot to the sideboard and pouring himself a finger of pastis, the liquid clouding opaquely with the addition of a single ice cube. He held the glass aloft as if toasting the ceiling. “This is a cultural transmission. A thread connecting the generations. My genes are in that boy, and my genes clearly contain an appreciation for post-punk revival with new-wave sensibilities.”
From down the hall, Brandon Flowers lamented that he never ever wanted to feel like he did that day. The song built to its frenetic, desperate crescendo and ended on a final, fading chord.
There was a brief pause, a digital silence. Then, a new sound emerged. A slow, echo-drenched acoustic strum, otherworldly and intimate, followed by a voice that was both fragile and utterly certain, singing about a starman waiting in the sky.
Sirius’s eyebrows shot up. He took a slow sip of his pastis. “Bowie,” he stated, his voice hushed with a new kind of reverence. “‘Starman.’ 1972. The Ziggy Stardust album. This isn’t just a good song choice, Remus. This is a statement.”
Remus had to admit the song was beautiful, a weird and wistful slice of cosmic pop that seemed to drift down the hallway and curl around the bookshelves. “It’s lovely,” he said softly.
“Lovely? It’s transcendent!” Sirius was practically vibrating. He set his glass down and started to pace the length of the rug, his movements fluid, energized. “First The Killers, who owe like half their sound to Bowie, and then the man himself. It’s a curated experience. He’s taking a journey. This is deliberate.”
They listened as the Starman promised to blow their minds. The song felt like a shared secret in the sun-drenched room. When it ended, another silence, deeper this time, settled. It stretched for five seconds, ten.
“What’s next, I wonder,” Sirius murmured, his eyes fixed on the hallway door. “T. Rex? Roxy Music? The full glam rock syllabus?”
What came next was not glam rock.
A single, clean, mournful electric guitar note rang out, repeated, and then a voice, cracked and full of self-loathing, whispered into the room.
“When you were here before…”
Sirius stopped pacing. His face went through a rapid series of adjustments: recognition, confusion, a dawning, delighted horror. “No,” he whispered.
Remus knew this one. It was harder, darker, a stone thrown through the pretty window Bowie had just opened. “Creep,” he said. “Radiohead.”
“Creep!” Sirius exploded, his voice a loud, gleeful whisper. He clapped a hand over his own mouth to stifle a laugh. “Oh, my perfect, dramatic, ridiculous son! From Starman to… to this! ‘I’m a creep, I’m a weirdo.’ Christ on a bike.”
“It’s a bit of a mood swing,” Remus agreed, a smile tugging at his own lips. He pictured Draco in his room, surrounded by fabric swatches and sketchbooks, headphoning on, sinking into the exquisite misery of the song. It was so quintessentially eighteen.
Sirius listened, his head tilted, his earlier artistic pride morphing into unabashed amusement. “He’s in his feels! He’s absolutely marinating in it! The hair is down, I guarantee it, probably over his face like a platinum curtain. He’s drawing something violently angsty, maybe a dress made of thorns and sorrow.”
“Or he’s just enjoying the music, Pads,” Remus offered, though he didn’t entirely believe it.
“No, no, this is a trilogy. This is a three-act play. Act One: The Killers. Anxious but energetic. Act Two: Bowie. Yearning for cosmic connection. Act Three: Radiohead. The crushing realization that you’re a weirdo on earth who doesn’t belong.” Sirius was in his element now, analyzing his child’s impromptu playlist as if it were a sacred text. “It’s the arc of every intelligent, creative teenager since the dawn of time. I’m so proud.”
Creep built to its raw, distorted climax, Thom Yorke howling about wanting a perfect body, a perfect soul, and then collapsed into static. The silence that followed felt final, drained.
“Well,” Remus said, picking up his biography again. “That was an emotional rollercoaster. Should we check on him? Bring a cup of tea and a hug?”
“And interrupt the process? Never.” Sirius reclaimed his pastis. “The muse is a fragile creature. Also, I want to see what the encore is.”
They waited. A full minute passed. The only sound was the distant hum of city traffic through the closed window.
Then, without warning, a punch so visceral it was almost physical.
BA-DA-DUM. BA-DA-DUM.
A wall of snarling, iconic AC/DC guitar ripped through the apartment, aggressive, swaggering, and utterly triumphant. Brian Johnson’s rasp screamed in celebration of being back.
Sirius choked on his pastis. Remus jumped, his book sliding to the floor.
“BACK IN BLACK!” Sirius roared, leaping to his feet. He didn’t just pace now; he air-guitared, windmilling an imaginary arm, his black curls flying. “He’s out of the pit! The despair is over! The weirdo has put on his leather jacket and decided to kick arse!”
Remus watched, utterly fond and completely helpless, as his fifty-year-old husband shredded an air solo in the middle of their living room, perfectly in time with Angus Young’s real one. The contrast was jarring, hilarious, and somehow perfectly Draco. From the depths of “Creep” to the defiant shout of “Back in Black.”
The song was all crashing drums and relentless, simple power. It was the opposite of everything that had come before. It was a cleanse. It was a reset. Sirius played his air guitar with total commitment, grimacing in faux rock-god agony, until the final chord rang out.
He finished with a flourish, panting slightly, his eyes bright. “Fuck. Yes.”
Before he could catch his breath, the music shifted again. The AC/DC fury faded, replaced by a slow, grinding, muddy bassline. A lazy, distorted guitar riff slid over it. Then a voice, Nirvana’s Cobain, slurring and detached, singing about a drain.
“‘Drain You.’ Nirvana. Nevermind,” Sirius panted, wiping imaginary sweat from his brow. “Okay. So we’re not staying in the cock-rock revival. We’re moving to the Seattle gutters. Darker, but still powerful. Less swagger, more… simmering rage. Interesting.”
This was a different animal. Sludgy, hypnotic, violently loving. It built and built, a pressure cooker of noise, until it exploded into the chaotic, thrashing finale. They listened, spellbound, as the song devoured itself in feedback.
As the last echo of noise died, something else emerged. Something spacious, heroic, a slow drum beat and a shimmering, sustained synthesizer note. Then Bowie’s voice again, but different now—clearer, older, full of a desperate, romantic conviction.
“‘Heroes,’” Remus said quietly. This one he knew well. It felt like a balm after the Nirvana fury. A promise. “David Bowie again.”
Sirius had gone still. He wasn’t air-guitaring now. He just stood in the rectangle of sunlight, listening as Bowie painted a picture of two lovers by the Berlin Wall, kissing as though nothing could fall apart. It was vast, aching, and ultimately hopeful. He looked at Remus, and a silent, profound understanding passed between them. This was more than a playlist. This was a map of a mood, a young man’s heart being worked out in chord progressions and lyrics.
The song soared, Bowie insisting that we could be heroes, just for one day, and then it faded into a beautiful, ringing decay.
Silence. A long, deep, respectful silence this time. The sun had moved. The rectangle of light was now mostly on the floor.
Sirius opened his mouth, likely to offer some profound analysis of the musical journey they’d just witnessed.
What came out of Draco’s room next was a synth blast of pulsing, unapologetic dance-pop. A robotic voice chanted a countdown. Then Ke$ha, autotuned and bratty, declaring at maximum volume that they were who they were, and we were gonna dance.
Sirius’s jaw hung open. Remus burst out laughing, a real, shoulder-shaking laugh that filled the room.
The song was a glitter bomb, a trashy, glorious, fist-pumping anthem of self-acceptance that completely obliterated the poignant atmosphere left by “Heroes.”
Sirius found his voice. It was strangled with disbelief and utter delight. “Is that… Ke$ha? ‘We R Who We R’? 2010? The one with the lyric about brushing teeth with a bottle of Jack?”
“I believe it is!” Remus wheezed, wiping his eyes.
“From Bowie… to Ke$ha!” Sirius exclaimed, throwing his hands up. “The whiplash! The absolute chaos! I love it! I love him! He’s a beautiful, unpredictable madman!” He started moving again, not with air guitar heroics, but with a ridiculous, shuffling club dance, all shoulders and sharp elbows. “This is the conclusion! The thesis statement! After all that angst and rock and heroism, you just have to say ‘fuck it’ and dance!”
Remus watched his husband bounce around the living room to the throbbing electro-pop beat, a tall, tattooed, middle-aged man joyfully embodying a song about drunk, glittery, club-going resilience. The scent of anise and old books, the fading light, the absurdity of the moment—it was perfection.
The song was reaching its peak, Ke$ha belting about dancin’ like we’re dumb, when the bedroom door at the end of the hall opened fully.
Draco appeared, looking pleasantly drained, his waist-long platinum hair tied up in a messy, utilitarian bun. A pencil was tucked behind his ear. He blinked into the living room, taking in the scene: Remus laughing helplessly in his armchair, Sirius doing what could only be described as a ‘grunge-rave’ hybrid dance move in the middle of the floor.
The music poured out from behind him, unabashed.
“Oh,” Draco said, his voice flat. “You can hear that.”
Sirius stopped dancing, planting his hands on his hips, his chest heaving. “Hear it? Chéri, we have just born witness to the entire psychological spectrum of Draco Black, as expressed through the medium of a meticulously chaotic Spotify playlist. It was breathtaking. I cried. I air-guitared. I contemplated the void. I danced.”
Draco leaned against the doorframe, a slow, smug smile spreading across his face. “So you liked it?”
“Liked it?” Sirius strode over, cupping Draco’s face in his hands. “My beautiful, bizarre son. You took us from yearning to self-loathing to triumphant ass-kicking to grunge depression to timeless heroism and landed, with the precision of a drunk skydiver, on a glitter-covered pop anthem about being a disaster. It was the most beautiful thing I’ve ever not personally curated.”
Remus finally caught his breath. “It was certainly… a journey. How are the textiles?”
“Textiles are fine. The vibe was… complicated.” Draco extracted himself from Sirius’s grasp, padding into the living room and collapsing onto the sofa next to Remus, his head falling onto his father’s shoulder. “Needed the musical exorcism