Chapter Text
This is what he knows: Regulus Black is beyond exhausted, and it’s only the first day of tech week.
So far he’s already had to glue one prop back together, search fifteen minutes for another one (it was under the prop table the whole time), lower the wings all by himself, and bust out the first aid kit for at least five bandaids, all the while they haven’t even started the actual run yet. And if he overhears one more actor wondering how much longer until they start, they’re going to need that first aid kit for more than just bandaids.
It doesn’t help that Marlene stares daggers at him every time he walks past her. It really doesn’t help that Pandora looks at him like he’s a stray puppy every time he walks past her.
It’s whatever. Regulus shakes his head, clearing thoughts away. There isn’t time for James nonsense.
He tries to focus on the script propped on the stand in front of him, pen twiddling between two fingers. The blue light above his head flickers once, again after a beat, while Pomfrey finally calls places for top of show. Regulus hears it duplicated, like a scratched record, her words filtered watery through Regulus’ headset clamped firmly over one ear. Somebody’s got to tell her to move her mic from her mouth. She always forgets. This happens every show; it’s a wonder Regulus’ eardrums aren’t totally shot.
When he looks up, Regulus can see clear across the stage to the opposite wing, where Pandora is facilitating her side. He watches her bend over to pick something off the floor, then furiously place it back on the prop table. The mechanical sapphire light on her headset bobs quietly along with her movement in the first wing of her side so that she lines up with Regulus. It’s all very like blue-hour, a false dusk: the lights, the softened contours. Regulus would know.
He looks back down at his script. Somehow, the pen has strayed towards his mouth, clicking and unclicking against his chin with a pop. The sound makes his eye twitch. There’s no one here, on his side of the stage. Why is there no one? Pomfrey called for places, there’s no one, Regulus is going to lose it.
Again, he attempts to zero in on the words in front of him, but it’s a losing battle. The light overhead flickers once more. The letters start to look like chasms, easy to fall into. There should be a set change here. Just a small one, but he hasn’t yet gauged how competent people backstage are. He has a good guess, though, and it isn’t positive.
That’s what this week is for, he tries to remember, and not for the first time. It doesn’t help much. His eyelids feel heavy over his sockets.
Regulus pretends to write something in his script, then looks up. There’s still no one here. At some point it falls to him to rally the actors, but rallying actors means going to the dressing room which is truly the last thing he wants to do.
He’s starting to seriously consider it the second time Pomfrey calls places and no one comes. Regulus is already steeling himself to go round them all up when the very reason he’s dreading it walks through the doorway.
Regulus is balancing his wrist against the top of the script stand, pen still dancing between his forefinger and thumb. His foot is tapping against the wood and it’s the loudest sound. He noticed the figure after a delay, stood against the backlit hallway fluorescence like a graphite drawing of a person, features crude and stupefied in pencil lead.
Regulus looks up the same second James stops short. He doesn’t see his halt, but the after effects ripple from him, emanating in waves of pure stupor that suspend his animation.
They’re the only two backstage for a handful of seconds. The pair just stares at each other. Regulus doesn’t quite know what to say, if he should say anything at all, and James just looks frozen like a glacier carcass. The blue light dances off his glasses. It offsets the copper in his eyes, every possible piece of him red. Which benevolent god deemed it fair to imbue his irises with red? Who did he bribe? How have the stars aligned just so to stain droplets of fire behind his pupils?
No. Not fair. Why are even his eyes red?
Why are—why are his cheeks red, too?
Just then, Regulus notices his script binder clutched in both of his hands. As if waking up with a hangover, Regulus swallows around his dry tongue and uses his pen to point at the binder. “You’re not supposed to still have that, you know.”
James’ silence stays vigilant.
Red and blue clash. “What?” Regulus provokes. “Why are you looking at me like that?”
James’ mouth opens as if to break his vow of silence, but nothing comes out. In his cheeks, his neck, red mingles with blue into a saturated violet like a wildflower bruise.
After days of watching only from afar, of paranoia, it isn’t quite real for James to just be standing in front of him like this. And to be looking at Regulus like that, his eyes sloped downward in what Regulus can only read as…stupefied?
His headset starts crackling in his ear, and Regulus jumps. Dorcas says something, something he should answer.
“We’re nearly ready back here,” he says into the mic without really knowing what the question was. Regulus turns from James to pretend to write something else in his script. “Give me a sec.”
He pushes the mic up again so it’s away from his mouth, ignoring James and whatever the hell his face is doing, but the rest of the actors trickle towards the wings in clumps without him fetching them. When did they get there? How long did James and Regulus just stare at each other?
God, this is pathetic.
James is thankfully snapped out of it by Peter dashing towards him for one last scan through his script. Regulus looks down at his hands and doesn’t glance back over until James is safely on stage, away from him and from whatever that was.
Whatever, whatever, whatever. He’ll figure it all out later. Too much to do already.
The rest of rehearsal doesn’t go well, because of course it doesn’t. Barty and Evan bicker up in the tech booth, running sound and lights respectively, and don’t have the courtesy to bicker off headset. Pomfrey keeps asking for backstage crew to pull off quick changes that just aren’t possible for them to do, and McGonagall goes along with her every word because she’s fucking lost for Pomfrey, like they’re the ones still in high school. Meanwhile Regulus runs around backstage as a military sergeant would, trying to keep his head above water. The rehearsal goes on for hours and it still isn’t enough time, and James doesn’t—won’t—look his way again. Regulus, driven mad with misunderstanding, can’t get the image of his face out of his head. Hit the brakes like he’s run out of gas, hitting his head, seeing stars. It doesn’t even fucking matter. No one backstage is doing anything correctly. His voice grows growly in the back of his throat, and he barely refrains from tearing his curls out by the seams.
At least Pandora’s there. He clings to her like a life line.
It’s over far too late, and far too soon. There’s still much to be done, but Pomfrey dismisses the actors, appearing haggard even though all they did for these precious hours was stand there while Evan painted them in light hues and tech moved set around them. Set that isn’t finished, hasn’t even been painted yet, so if everyone could stop complaining and actually get something fucking done, Regulus might be able to sleep tonight.
His voice still hasn’t returned to normal when the tech gather onstage after Pomfrey and her actors have left, as they lay out tarps all across the floor and heave buckets of poorly mixed paint towards wooden chunks of set. Regulus brings a vat of white acrylic to Pandora where she stands atop their tarp, wringing her hands like she wants to say something and then apparently thinking better of it. Regulus bends down to pour the paint into the roller pan so they can start, not noticing the glance Pandora casts to Evan over him.
“Regulus,” she says slowly, as if beginning a cautionary tale.
“Painting,” he replies shortly, as a means of escape.
Pandora gets the message, not like it does any good. “Right. Just, are you sure that—”
She’s interrupted by the sound of Evan yelping, and they both turn to see the side of his face dusted with flecks of burgundy paint, Barty nearby innocently examining his fingernails.
“Really, guys?” Regulus says, exhausted.
Evan’s mouth drops open, looking appalled. “He started it!” he argues, pointing an accusatory finger at Barty.
“Seriously, Rosier, you really think so little of me?” Barty says, though his lip is hitched up, warping around his piercing.
“He doesn’t, but I do,” Pandora says, her arms crossed over her chest.
Barty lofts his paintbrush, and Evan ducks away. “Watch where you’re aiming that thing.”
“I know exactly where I’m aiming it,” Barty snickers, and flicks more paint that splatters the fabric across Evan’s shirt. He grins wickedly, in the way only he can. “I never miss either.”
“You’re such a fucking loser,” Regulus deadpans.
Evan nods, trying to wipe at his shirt and only making it worse. “Yeah, your one-liners are never as cool as you think they are.”
“That’s not what you were saying yesterday when we were—”
“Okay!” Pandora claps her hands, “That’s enough of that conversation.”
Evan laughs and wields his own paintbrush, weighted with brown paint, though when he snaps his wrist back, acrylic flying through the air, it’s much more graceful than Barty. As if manipulating time, Regulus watches the paint fly through the air in slow motion and sees it speckle Pandora’s braids as if in an abstract art installation.
Pandora’s mouth falls open in shock which quickly turns to rage, and Regulus, caught in the cross-fire, is painted in droplets of all different colors in a manner of minutes.
Barty laughs maniacally, as if this was his plan all along (it was). He dips the end of his brush in the paint bucket once more and sets about writing his initials rapidly along Evan’s arm while he’s occupied getting his sister as riled up as possible. Regulus is decidedly uncomfortable with the sheer amount of color splattering the front of his shirt, color that he knows he’ll never be able to get out.
Barty finishes the ‘c’ with a flourish just as McGonagall strides in.
Everyone pauses.
In the midst of the silence, Barty lowers his paintbrush.
“I’d like to say I’m surprised, but all present would know that’s a lie,” McGonagall says, regarding the scene over her glasses, the cut of her mouth severe.
Evan opens his mouth. McGonagall swipes a hand through the air. “I don’t care who’s fault it is, Mr. Rosier. Just that they clean up. Immediately.”
All four of them look at Barty, who still grins in the face of anger.
No one moves for a count of five, until McGonagall has to literally usher them towards the backstage bathroom to wash all the evidence off. Barty tries to follow, but McGonagall holds him back with a command. On their way out the door, Evan turns and salutes to him, doing a horrible job to contain his laughter when Barty flips him off without McGonagall seeing.
Pandora rolls her eyes. “Don’t you ever quit?”
“Nope,” Evan says brightly.
Pandora sighs through her teeth and turns on her heel towards the girls’ bathroom. At the last second, she throws over her shoulder, “You’re explaining the paint stains to Mom and Dad.”
In the wake of her leave, Evan turns to Regulus in horror.
Immediately, Regulus puts his palms forward. “Oh, no. You’re leaving me out of this.”
“Come on, she’s a terror!”
“You just threw paint at her and you’re the victim here?”
Evan just grins something chesire at him, and Regulus rolls his eyes all the way through the bathroom entrance towards the sink.
They wash in silence for a while. There’s no sound but for running water and Evan hissing whenever it gets too cold.
At some point, eyes blurred by the red paint swirling down the drain like blood, Evan clears his throat, and Regulus realizes he’s turned the tap off. Hands bracketing either side of the sink, Regulus looks at Evan, who stares straight back at him with his hip against the edge of his own sink in a stance reminiscent of his sister.
“What?” Regulus snaps at him, vision still stained red, and that’s when he sees something dangling from Evan’s finger.
His eyes narrow. “Evan.”
Evan whistles once, his irises glittering as he twirls Regulus’ car keys around and around his finger. “Regulus.”
“Why do you have those?”
“Why are you running your backstage tech like a boot camp?”
His eyes narrow further, a frown cleaving into his mouth. “I’m not. No one’s getting shit done.”
“Okay, so? That’s every tech week. I’ve been in shows with you before, and you’re not usually this bad.”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“See!” Evan gestured towards him, his hackles raised without Regulus even realizing and his fists clenched at his sides. “Look, I’ve known you a long time, and I’ve never seen you this pathetic. It’s like watching those fucking dog shelter commercials. I can hear the music and everything.”
“Evan, seriously, give me my keys.”
“It’s pitiful. I’m embarrassed for you.”
“Can you stop?” Regulus rubs at his temples. “Please.”
“I’m just trying to help.”
“How is you stealing my car keys being helpful?”
Evan shows his canines. “I couldn’t make it easy for you, now could I?” He stops twirling the key set and instead examines the little lego astronaut, its skin an ugly shade of yellow and the red star gleaming above where its heart would be. “Besides, Lord knows you need a little push.”
Regulus doesn’t respond, though his mouth tastes sour.
Evan, blessedly, doesn’t question the lego figurine, though they both know who it’s from. The name goes unsaid, and Regulus thinks that maybe Evan understands a little of what’s going on in his head. Barty looms out of sight.
It doesn’t get him off the hook, though. “This is me pushing you. Whatever you did, you need to find a way to fix it, or else there won’t be any tech left by opening night.”
Regulus feels caught in fight or flight, frozen in time, and he feels himself teetering into fight. Gritting his teeth, he asks, “Why does everyone assume I’m the one who messed up?”
“Were you?” Evan counters.
His silence is telling enough.
The car keys sway back and forth from Evan’s finger. Regulus swears the astronaut winks at him. “So?” Evan says.
Regulus looks away, only to be met by his reflection in the bathroom mirror. Were those bags under his eyes always that bad?
Caught, there’s nowhere for him to turn. There never was.
Inevitably, Regulus forces through his teeth, “Fine.” Evan’s face lights up, back to the way it was before. “Now give me the goddamn keys you thief.”
Smiling, Evan tosses them to him. The astronaut digs into the palm of his hand when he asks, “But how am I supposed to catch him? He’ll be long gone.”
Regulus feels a thrill running down his spine at just the allusion to James, the pronoun confession, the poking of the bear. Evan doesn’t even bat an eye. He only reaches into that very same pocket and underhand throws something that Regulus doesn’t have time to see until he catches it.
Pooling in the divot of his palm is the gold chain James is always wearing, the one tucked underneath his shirt.
Regulus looks from the necklace back to Evan, his eyes wide. At Regulus’ silent question, Evan just shrugs. “He took it off during his fitting today. Figured it was important, if he wears it every day. Doubt he left without it.”
“You’re insane,” Regulus deduces.
“You didn’t know that already?” Evan asks, smirking, leaving Regulus alone in the bathroom with James’ necklace and the dregs of paint staining the bathroom sinks.
That’s when Regulus starts running.
He dashes from the bathroom, down the back hallway and out the doors to the lockers near the cafeteria. Swiveling his head around, he doesn’t see anyone. No head of curly hair, nothing like a red jacket. What if James really didn’t notice the chain missing, if he’s already gone? Regulus, desperate, is possessed by the need to get this over with now, to see James and talk to him and—and Regulus doesn’t know what. But he’s got to do it right now.
He starts racing towards the cafeteria, the chain burning holes into his palm. Every flash of red sears into his brain. He’s gone, fuck, he’s left already, probably walked in the chill autumn evening, the type where you can see your own breath, and fuck, that’s Regulus’ doing, because he couldn’t keep his mouth shut and he got so fucking angry and—
And he’s there.
Regulus stops in his tracks, breath heaving.
James doesn’t see him. He’s bent over, on his knees, searching underneath one of the high tables along the wall of windows near the front doors, the ones Regulus meets Pandora at every morning. Or, he used to, before he stopped getting to school early, afraid of a student who doesn’t even really go to his school.
Okay, yeah, maybe Evan’s right. He’s a little pathetic. As if he didn’t know that already.
Reality comes washing back, the simple fact that James is still mad at him looming large in his head. Disregarding whatever dumbfounded moment James had earlier, he’s still angry, like he should be, angry in a way Regulus doesn’t know how to magically fix. There he is, in front of him, bent double in search of the chain looped around Regulus’ knuckles as he struggles to catch his breath. Regulus takes a moment for the sunset outside the windows, melting across the horizon like a cracked egg. Regulus takes a moment for the sunset, falling across James’ shoulders as a cloak, a moat, a first line of defense. Defense against Regulus, most likely, as dusk. The destroyer of light.
Regulus is about to say something, he really is. He builds himself up to it, but James catches sight of him too soon.
And then he jumps so hard he hits his head against the table.
Regulus sighs; they’ve really got to stop doing this.
“Ow! What the—how long have you been standing there?” James rubs his head, mussing his curls, and sits back on his heels. “What do you want?”
Regulus blinks, and realizes he has no idea where to go from here. “Um,” he clears his throat. “I was just—”
“Where did you get that?” James interrupts him, pointing at the necklace wrapped around Regulus’ fingers.
At this point, Regulus has heard James mad plenty of times. His voice has never sounded as angry as it does now.
Taken aback, Regulus temporarily forgets how to speak.
“Regulus Black where the fuck did you get that,” James repeats. On paper it should be a question. It doesn’t sound like one.
Just then it clicks, his mind still going a mile a minute and his breath still escaping him. “Oh, you think—” Regulus trips over his words, “—you think I stole it?”
James’ face is livid. “What the hell else am I supposed to think?”
“I didn’t fucking steal your necklace, James, are you crazy?” Regulus stammers, eyes wide with shock and almost offended.
James looks just as offended, if not more so. “Then how did you get it?”
“It’s—” Regulus starts, and then realizes he’d have to explain that Evan is, in fact, the one who stole it. And also the conversation that entailed. “Well, it’s a long story. But I didn’t steal it.”
Regulus tosses him the necklace, and James catches it in his fist. He examines it closely, eyes narrowed behind the lenses of his glasses, before peering back up at Regulus. “Where was it?”
“You left it in the dressing room,” Regulus swallows.
James’ face dawns with understanding as he fastens the chain around his neck once again. Then his expression fades fast into guilt. “Right,” he says awkwardly, face sheepish. “Sorry.”
“It’s whatever.”
They blink at each other. For a moment, Regulus forgets why he’s there.
Then he clears his throat, shoving his hands in his pockets in a habit frighteningly similar to the very boy across from him. “It’s—whatever. It’s cold outside. You shouldn’t have to walk in the cold.”
“…What are you saying?”
“I’m saying I don’t think you should have to walk in the cold.”
James scoffs, then stands. “You’re not the only person I know with a license, you know that right?”
Regulus frowns. “Yeah, but—”
“James, I can’t find it anywhere, have you had any—” someone else interrupts, and Regulus turns to see Marlene coming around the corner. She halts in place when they make eye contact, and her gaze immediately goes cold. “...James?” she says again, though her voice is significantly lower.
“Sorry,” Regulus says, “I found—well I was—”
“Why now?” James cuts in.
Regulus stops.
When he turns back, James’ eyes are trained on him in a way they haven’t been for weeks. Like Regulus is the sole object of his focus.
Regulus tries not to take a step back. “...What?”
“Why,” James enunciates every letter, pausing between the two words, “now?”
“James,” Marlene says again, though this time it sounds more like a warning.
Regulus swallows hard around his Adam’s apple. Every cell in his body is aware of Marlene standing just a few feet away, awaiting his reply. He feels the air on his skin, the gravity binding all three of them together, but most of all he feels James’ eyes on him and him alone.
The swallow doesn’t help a lot. Regulus forces out, “I need to talk to you.”
James’ eyes narrow again, once, quickly, like he’s assessing his prey.
“James, I think we should go,” Marlene says, and something cruel, ugly blooms in Regulus’ gut, something that produces an image of James in Marlene’s passenger’s seat instead of his, making her laugh, picking her music.
It isn’t pleasant. Regulus doesn’t feel kind. His lip curls at the very thought of anyone else driving James’ home. Later, he won’t be proud of it, that ugly beast come alive behind his ribs, but now all he can do is feel it.
He only barely refrains from saying something nasty, but it certainly translates onto his face. Good thing Marlene stands behind him, but his expression is on full display for James and he can’t do anything about it. Right now he doesn’t want to.
James is still peering at him, and a shiver gets sent down Regulus’ spine. He hasn’t had that examination feeling wash over him for days. Where he normally would have shied away, Regulus instead meets him head on.
For a brief moment there’s something in the air. Something electric. Almost dangerous.
Smelling ozone, James doesn’t break eye contact when he says, “Nevermind. Marlene, you go ahead.”
If Regulus were to look away, he would see Marlene shifting her weight from one foot to the other, eyes darting between the pair of them. “You’re sure?”
James breaks the stare to nod at Marlene, and Regulus starts breathing again.
“Okay,” Marlene says dubiously, and Regulus can tell she still doesn’t trust him as far as she could throw him. Regulus doesn’t really care.
She exits out the front doors, and then it’s just the two of them.
James’ expression is still shuttered, cautious. Regulus can still smell ozone. “Well?” James asks, gesturing forward. “Lead the way.”
“Right,” Regulus says, his thoughts still scattered, his pulse rabbiting over whatever the hell just passed between them. “Right.” He looks around; the cafeteria is still empty. He feels like he’s forgetting something, that there’s some camera somewhere, someone pulling a prank on him. He goes to adjust the strap on his backpack, then realizes he doesn’t have it. “Right, I need to get my stuff. Give me a second.”
James sighs, and Regulus tries not to let that go to his head. Or worry, as he’s hurrying back into the theater, that James will be gone by the time he gets back.
He grabs his stuff from the shop quickly, shouldering his books and giving a middle finger to Barty who whistles after him. He doesn’t catch Pandora anywhere, so he just sends a text saying he’ll be back, if McGonagall asks for him. He doesn’t wait for a reply.
His heart is still pounding as he leaves the auditorium, convinced James will have disappeared, but he’s still there waiting for him. At the sight of Regulus, out of breath and probably red in the face, James raises one eyebrow. “Ready?”
“Let’s go.”
Walking out of the building with James at his heels is surreal. It’s like nothing’s changed. Nothing, but for the fact that James cracks no joke, just squints into the sunset and keeps diligently forward. Nothing but for Regulus unaware of how to talk to him, what to even say. Silently, in his head, he’s cursing Evan in every way he knows how.
They clamber into his car and James doesn’t tap the spine of Crush. Regulus tries not to let that go to his head.
He would say it’s something like their first car ride together but that couldn’t be further from the truth. Then, James had been trying desperately to scale Regulus’ walls, and having his own one-sided conversations. Then, Regulus didn’t know anything about him. Didn’t know his favorite book from when he was a kid, or the way his voice sounds when he’s tired, late at night in the passenger’s seat. Regulus didn’t know how the voice would settle in the dusk air, lying across the dashboard while the console buttons flash and wink at them. So many things he didn’t know then that he does now, things that he has nowhere to put down. They’re cramming in his head, multiplying and eating away at his memory like maggots. Regulus doesn’t know what to do with all this memory, these car rides, without anywhere to stop, let them go, rest. He can’t rest. He won’t sleep tonight. Regulus’ foot spasms on the accelerator and the car gives a small lurch, and he craves so badly to just floor it, floor it and see where it takes them, floor it until the very fabric of spacetime warps around them, until they jump back to a time where James wasn’t angry and Regulus wasn’t tired. And then Regulus remembers there is no timeline that exists in which he isn’t tired.
James doesn’t grab the overhead handle but he looks like he wants to, his knuckles pulled white hanging on to his chair. Regulus tries not to roll his eyes; it wasn’t that bad. Nothing like what he wants to do, as he pulls out of the school parking lot, nothing like the speed at which Regulus’ thoughts rebound around his head.
He tries to focus on the road in front of him, but he can barely see through the sun. It sits on the horizon directly in his line of vision, the winter evening accelerating towards them at a rate Regulus is jealous of. He’s jealous of a lot of things these days.
There is stuff to say but Regulus is too afraid to start. His speech shrivels in the back of his throat, and James’ eyes just stay trained out the window.
Regulus pulls up to a red light, the same light to turn into the gas station where Regulus hit his head weeks ago. The lot is empty.
Eventually, James exhales loudly through his nose, loud enough to make sure Regulus hears it, and Regulus wants to scream.
He doesn’t. “What?” Regulus forces through his teeth instead.
“You said you wanted to talk,” James tells him like he’s five years old. “So talk.”
Regulus clears his throat and still can’t get his eyes to focus on the road in front of him. The red light is blurred in his vision, dancing across the painted street like wildfire. He tries to speak but nothing happens.
James laughs, but it isn’t funny. “Silence. Shocker.”
“I’m trying,” Regulus protests weakly.
“Okay, Regulus,” James says, sounding exhausted.
Regulus frowns. “I am.”
“Go.”
“What?”
James points out the windshield. “The light’s green. Go.”
His foot jerks again, except it’s worse this time, and James really does grab the handle. “Jesus fucking Christ, Regulus, drive the car.”
“I’m driving the damn car!” Regulus snaps.
“Fine!” James snaps back, and Regulus’ fingers tighten around the wheel.
After a moment of silence, Regulus grits his teeth and says, “You can let go of the handle now.”
“I’m not sure I want to.”
His vision is still blurred, even worse now, blurred by the sun and the red and paint lines and none of this should matter, James shouldn’t sound like that, Regulus just makes it worse. “Hey, I’m not the angry one here.”
“Really?” James tenses as they turn a corner. “Because you’re certainly driving like you are.”
“I’m not angry. You’re the one who’s angry.”
“Yes, Regulus, I’m fucking angry!”
“I don’t know what you want from me!”
“Just—” James makes a frustrated noise and stares hard out the window. “God, I don’t even know how to talk to you.”
Blurred blurred even more blurred, Regulus tries to blink it away, almost misses the stop sign at an intersection and hurries to press on the brake. Unidentifiable plots of land pass by outside, houses that all look the same, mailbox clusters and cracks in the sidewalk and the sun breaking in the distance like a comet aimed straight at them. Squinting against the horizon Regulus pleads, “Just fucking tell me what I should say to fix it.”
James makes another frustrated sound and leans forward with his elbows on his knees, hanging his head and pulling at his hair, “God, see, Regulus, that’s the problem! I shouldn’t have to tell you what you need to say, that’s not how this works at all!”
“Then how does it work?” The car goes faster, neighbourhood antenna wire whizzing by outside.
“You tell me things! You fucking open up to someone! So we never get in this mess in the first place!”
Regulus’ breath gets rapid in his chest. “It isn’t that easy—”
“Yes!” James practically yells. “Yes, it is! I’m not going to fucking laugh at you or think you’re stupid for something actively making your life harder. I don’t understand why you would ever think that. I might even be able to help you!”
Regulus starts laughing, manically laughing, void of humor and afraid, God, so afraid, and all the houses look the same, the horizon keeps getting further away, birds don’t sing in cages, they wail. Everything looks the same, everything looks sacred, and everything looks red. And Regulus can’t, he can’t say anything, can’t talk, because that admits something’s wrong, and then he’s weak and James is free to use it against him someday, when the priests come knocking and Regulus finally says something wrong, drunk off communion wine, drugged by Jesus’ blood. This is identified confession, in which a Father recognizes his face, drags him to the altar as a lamb sacrifice, a confession in which Regulus has to admit his sins in broad daylight, that James is a boy and his friend and at once not, that Regulus—he—and he can’t. And it all keeps crumbling.
James keeps going, words Regulus can’t hear anymore and houses he can’t separate, suffocated, caged, rules on the road and sunlight cracked against dusk as James pleads, “God, hasn’t anybody ever helped you? How can you have never even built a lego set before meeting me? How are you okay with that, carrying it all by yourself? I’ve tried, and I can’t stop trying to shoulder some of that burden, but you have to be the fucking island, the condemned, like you think you’re unsalvageable at sixteen. And I’m exhausted—”
The sun and the red and the suburb and the evergreen treetops and sin confessions and legos and numb and fear and his mother and boys and pity and saviors and ugly gut feelings and jealousy and the other kind of ugly gut feeling, the one that feels good, the one where your eyes linger too long on his hands and his glasses and his hair and if only you were different and if only you were better and if only you weren’t raised like that and if only you were grateful and if only your brother didn’t leave and if only you weren’t worth being left and if only you could time travel or teleport so you could get out of here, get out of this car or out of this neighbourhood or this town or this country or your body if only you were kind if only you were worth it and he didn’t leave or he took you with him or at least he left a note, an explanation, a reason for his desertion, if only altars were just altars and boys were just boys and light years were just light so you could close your eyes and they would disappear if only brothers were just brothers and not martyrs, if only you were someone else. If only you were someone else.
“—because I’m only just seventeen and I said I’m not a savior even though I should be. I have a habit of it. And you’re still silent, because that’s all it is with you, is silence, when you could’ve just explained, up in the loft, and I could’ve helped, or at least listened because obviously whoever this Sirius person is—”
Regulus swerves.
The tires screech loud against the asphalt. And then there’s no asphalt at all. They fly offroad on some unremarkable rural backroad, deserted but for them, and, horrified, Regulus slams on the brake just before they hit an evergreen.
They stay frozen. Regulus grips the wheel so tightly his fingers all start tingling. He’s pushed so far back into his chair that his elbows are locked, and he refuses to take his foot off the brake, or even move a muscle. He thinks James might have screamed, but for now the only sound is their heavy breathing as their minds catch up with what happened. Or what almost happened.
The pine needles sway in the breeze.
Regulus heaves his breath and pulls the gearshift into park, and the car gently rocks forward. Adrenaline still keeps him high for now, mind reeling. He doesn’t want to look at James, at how pale his face has gone.
Regulus swallows. “Sorry, the—” his head rings with the sound of his brother’s name, “—the sun was in my eye.”
Shell-shocked, terror that must manifest in anger, makes James lean over and pull down the visor over Regulus’ head passive aggressively, his movement jerky with his temper. But Regulus doesn’t even register. His breath is moving oddly quick, quicker still, so much so that he can’t breath, and he can’t let go of the wheel, can’t unlock his elbows, can barely even move.
Oh, his breath shouldn’t be moving that quickly. Regulus thinks it from far away. He taps out, goes numb, shuts off, can’t breath, can’t think, can’t breathe and can’t breathe and still can’t breathe, his lungs heaving like a ship over rocky waves, oxygen shuttering through him and escaping just as quickly.
He thinks maybe he hears his name, but it sounds far away. At first it isn’t a question, but it soon evolves. For a second time, “Regulus?” Then the voice grows louder, shot with urgency, “Regulus!” and someone’s hand touches his shoulder and it burns.
“Okay, okay, Regulus, listen to me, I’m going to unbuckle your seatbelt, okay?” And Regulus registers a soft click, numb and scared and panicked and Jesus. Then, “I unbuckled your seatbelt, I’m turning the car off, Reg,” the engine goes quiet and he doesn’t hear it, “I’m coming over, fuck, okay I’m coming—” and the passenger door opens, letting in a woosh of cold autumn air that stings all over as Regulus clutches the steering wheel like it’s a life ring on his ship at sea, or there is no ship, it’s only him, his body in the water and freezing and clinging to the only thing that floats for now until he drowns and his body floats with it and his lungs still aren’t operating correctly like they’re supposed to when his car door opens and lets in another rush of air before there’s a body blocking it, blocking out the sun just freshly sunken beneath the skyline. Someone says, “Regulus, look at me, okay? Reg?” and Regulus can tell they’re trying to cover up the panic in their voice even though they aren’t doing a very good job. He feels lightheaded, like he might pass out, which in some backseat part of his brain he’s pretty sure isn’t ideal.
More hands reach for his wrists on the wheel, burning, fucking burning as they pry his fingers from the leather before moving to his knees and pulling his legs to face outside, and without that steering wheel supporting him, keeping him afloat, Regulus just—
He collapses.
His body folds in on itself, curling around his stomach and over his lungs. His limbs won’t obey him. His nervous system sends electric shocks all throughout his body, so much so that he worries whoever’s helping him will be electrocuted as they guide him forward, controlling that collapse until his head settles between his knees and rests on something both hard and soft at once.
“Okay, good, Regulus,” a quiet voice says in his ear. “Now, I know it isn’t easy, but if you don’t stop hyperventilating you’ll pass out. Listen to me, Reg. Match me.”
This someone reaches for his hand clutching at the car seat underneath him. At first, Regulus tries to jerk away, and the heaving spikes again.
In his ear, louder now with accumulating desperation, “I know, Reg, I know! I’m trying to help, I swear. That’s all I want, is to help. So you don’t faint, okay?” And slower this time, they take his hand and splay his palm against their chest, above the heart Regulus can feel rabbiting underneath their ribs. “Feel the rise and fall, okay? And match it.”
Regulus tries to nod against wherever his head is resting but he isn’t sure the message comes across. Lungs expand underneath his hand, overexaggerated.
It’s an uphill battle. Regulus’ breathing will grow slower after a long time, then he’ll get ahead of himself and it all picks up again, so that every step forward ends in three steps back. Sometimes he can’t even control the breath, inhaling in quick succession like his lungs are trying to force their way through his mouth. His vision goes black at the edges a handful of times, but slowly, slowly, he calms down.
His eyes close at some point. When he opens them again he blinks through an onslaught of trapped tears. His vision swims at first, and he can’t make sense of what he’s seeing. Dirt underneath him. The tires of his car. The stains on James’ jeans from kneeling in the grass. As if emerging from a nightmare, Regulus gradually comes back to himself, and registers his forehead in the crook of James’ neck, the fabric tearstained. He’s pretty sure James’ hand is in his hair. The other one is curled around his calf. Regulus’ own hand is fisted in the fabric of James’ shirt. He’s leaning precariously out of the car, halfway off his seat, in a position that can’t be comfortable for either of them, but Regulus can’t bring himself to move. When he exhales the shaky breath pools in James’ collarbone.
Regulus shudders, suddenly immeasurably tired. When he speaks, his voice comes out broken and still watery. “When I said I wanted to talk this was not what I meant.”
The words are barely above a whisper but James still laughs, and it sounds half-crazed, so shaken but trying valiantly not to show it. Regulus barely holds back his protest when James’ hand leaves his hair, the other one letting go of his leg. James lifts Regulus’ head gently from his shoulder and sits back on his heels to look him in the eye. Regulus holds weakly to his wrists, James’ hands not leaving his jaw.
“Regulus,” is all he says.
It’s terribly soft. Regulus lets his heavy eyes close. “I’m okay.”
“Wrong answer.”
“I’ve been better.”
“There you go,” James agrees, thumb dragging at the skin under his jaw.
Regulus sighs, leaning into the touch despite himself. “What now?”
“You tell me.”
His mouth twitches. “I really just want to go to sleep.”
“There’s a backseat,” James answers, and Regulus cracks one eye to look at him. “What?”
Regulus snorts. “I’m not going to sleep in the backseat of my car while we’re on the side of the road.”
“I’m just saying it’s an option.”
His eye closes again. The dusk hour isn’t really helping the sudden sleepiness. “I don’t really feel like making a decision right now.”
James cocks his head to one side and then the other. “Fair enough.”
Regulus sighs again, through his teeth. He pitches forward, halfway back to James’ shoulder but not all the way there. James’ hand has curled to reach the hairs at the base of his neck, the other curved around the shell of his ear. There’s silence for a few breaths, as much as the side of a deserted road can be silent: cicadas, birdsong, echoing. There is no sun anymore, and instead the nail of the moon slivers between the tops of trees. A few stars wink at them, the only ones close enough to break through all the light pollution. Regulus can feel James’ pulse against the inside of his wrist—thankfully slowed down—and knows he should say something.
“Thank you,” is all he can manage.
He feels more than sees James shake his head. He doesn’t say anything else.
Something distant occurs to Regulus. “How did you…do you know how to deal with all that?”
The fingers playing with his hair hesitant for a second. Then James just shrugs. “My dad gets them sometimes. Mom helps usually. I’ve just watched. It’s happened once or twice at catering events, but I think he tries to hide them from me.”
Regulus hums. His limbs feel heavy, entire body feels heavy, and eventually he leans all the way forward until his forehead is against James’ shoulder again. He still holds the wrist of the hand in his hair, but James’ other one circles around his ankle instead of his calf this time, holding it gently. It doesn’t burn anymore. Maybe it should, but it doesn’t.
Regulus takes one shuddering breath in, and he doesn’t know what causes him to finally say it. Maybe it’s because he isn’t looking James in the face anymore, maybe because his tongue is too loose with tiredness, maybe it’s the cicadas or the crescent moon at dusk. Maybe he finally just feels safe for once. Here, of all places, Regulus whispers, “Sirius is my brother.”
There it is.
That’s it. Four words and it’s out in the open, and Regulus can never take them back.
James tenses at all the places they touch, and against his own neck Regulus feels the exhale of an, “Oh.”
“It’s—he was my brother.”
“Was?” James’ grip tightens around his ankle.
Regulus shakes his head against James’ shoulder, dragging the fabric. “No, he didn’t—die. He isn’t dead.” Salt pricks at his eyes, tears stinging and threatening to fall. God, two years and he’s still crying over Sirius like he left just yesterday. “He could be dead for all I know.”
“What happened?” James whispers.
“He left,” Regulus says simply. James either doesn’t notice his voice crack or kindly chooses to ignore it.
“Why?” James breathes, defeated.
Regulus squeezes his eyes tighter. “Your guess is as good as mine.”
James lifts his head again, and this time Regulus blinks his eyes open, squinting against all the blue light. It takes him a moment to make out James’ face in the darkness. His frown, his curls ghosting around his temples. “But surely there must have been a reason,” he says, always quick to assume the best.
Regulus blinks, and then just shrugs, turning the silver rings on his fingers. “Well, my parents are…you probably guessed already. We didn’t have a very good childhood. I remember…my mother threw all our baby teeth away. Right in front of us. She said they were bad luck. Sirius with blood dripping over his bottom lip. He was bloody like that a lot. I didn’t know the tooth fairy even existed until I was like, ten. The nights when I sat outside his bedroom, in the hallway, afraid of knocking. I was scared. I kept thinking I heard God. And I remember locked doors. A lot of locked doors. Sirius picked his and we passed notes underneath mine until she came upstairs and he had to hide. Until…” Regulus gets a far away look in his eye. “Until he stopped trying to hide anymore.”
“Reg, that’s—”
“I know it’s bad. I blocked a lot of it out. But I survived. We survived together. I thought we were still surviving together, but…” his eyes sting. “I woke up one morning and suddenly we weren’t. I don’t know. He could be dead and I’d be none the wiser.”
James reaches up and runs his thumb across the dark circle beneath Regulus’ eye. “It sounds like he did everything he could, Regulus. You have to believe that. You did, too. You still are. It’s remarkable.”
“I don’t think I’d call it remarkable. Just surviving.”
“Those are the same thing.”
Regulus blinks. James looks steadfast, unwavering. His eyes really are very lovely at dusk.
Weakly, Regulus whispers, “I just wish he’d taken me with him.”
James’ eyes soften, and when Regulus starts finally, quietly crying, he rises on his knees and envelopes him.
James is an underhand hugger, his arms going around Regulus’ torso. Distantly, Regulus thinks it makes sense, for James to hug like this, but he doesn’t have any reason why. It just does.
Regulus hasn't cried in…he can’t remember how long. It feels weird, sticky against his cheeks, and a lot less pretty than it sounds. He doesn’t make a lot of noise. He learned not to young. The tears come silently, nothing like the panic from before. Where that had been a breakdown, this is more release. It’s easier with James there, shielding his body from the cold. A lot is easier with James there.
The tear tracks dry in what is probably not enough time, but Regulus can only take so much at once. He should let go, but he doesn’t, that ashamed, ugly part of himself wanting it to last forever, the part that crawls feebly towards light in the cracked sliver of a cave ceiling. His arms fit nice around James’ neck. Regulus’ brow is neatly burrowed in James’ hair, the curls coarse and unruly. Regulus twisting the hair at his temples around his finger probably isn’t helping. His shampoo smells like coconut, which makes sense in the same way James being an underhand hugger makes sense. The evening grows gloomier around them, in between them, the unkempt grass dancing with the wind. Another car goes by on the rural backroad, headlights bright and foggy, and abruptly Regulus remembers where they are.
Regulus clears his throat, properly sitting up in his chair. Wiping at his eyes with his sleeve, he mumbles, “I should probably head back.”
James clasps his elbows, concern evident in his eyes. “Go back where?”
“To the school. The rehearsal.” Internally, Regulus cringes at having already been away for so long, the questions he’ll face from Pandora. The messages probably already flooding his phone.
James immediately frowns. “Um. No.”
Regulus frowns back at him. “There’s still painting to do.”
“Regulus you can barely keep your eyes open.”
Regulus shakes his head. “I can do it.”
“I don’t doubt that you can but that definitely doesn’t mean you should.” James ducks his head a little to make better eye contact with him. “When was the last time you slept a full night?”
Regulus winces. “That depends on what your definition of a ‘full night’ is.”
“See, that answer really doesn’t help your case.”
“You can’t tell me what to do.”
“No, but I can strongly advise, and since I’m only just not mad at you anymore you should do what I say.”
Regulus raises one eyebrow. “That’s the argument you’re going for?”
“I thought it was solid,” James defends, but he’s grinning. “Careful, or I’ll get mad again.”
Regulus waves a hand vaguely in the space between them. “Until this whole thing I wasn’t even sure you were capable.”
“Oh, ha ha,” James says. “I can get plenty mad, believe me.”
“I do,” Regulus answers. “Believe you, I mean.”
Regulus watches James’ expression, his eyes darting between both of Regulus’ own, the funny little divot in his chin when he frowns. Regulus feels like putting his thumb there.
He doesn’t, blinking to dispel the thought. Then, rubbing his eye, Regulus realizes James is waiting for him to say something.
His hand drops to his lap. “What?”
James squeezes both of his elbows. “You aren’t really going back, are you?”
Regulus searches his face again, absorbing the true, pure concern drenching all of his features. He needs to clean his glasses again. They’re crooked on his nose from the hug.
Regulus sighs. “No, I’m not going back.”
“Good,” James nods.
“Okay, I’ve stopped having a fit, you can get back in the car now,” Regulus says, and James swats at his knee as he rises, making the corners of his lips tick up. Regulus pushes him away in retaliation, laughing under his breath when James stumbles lightly around the front of the car.
Regulus turns in his seat to face the wheel again, grabbing his phone from the cupholder. Sure enough, there are a handful of unanswered texts from Pandora, which he scans lightly and doesn’t really absorb. He just tells her he isn’t coming back for the rest of tech, and hopes that’s enough for now.
James clambers into the passenger’s seat and thankfully doesn’t act like a restrained animal this time. “Are you sure you’re okay to drive?”
Regulus pulls his seatbelt across his torso and waits to hear the click. “I don’t really have a choice do I?”
James shrugs. “You could come stay with me. I’m closer.”
Regulus stills with his palm on the gearshift.
James hears the click of his own seatbelt and, when Regulus doesn’t answer, looks up to find him staring. “Reg?”
Regulus blinks. “Stay with you?”
“Yes, at my house. The one you were driving me to?”
His tongue feels leaden in his mouth. “Are you sure?”
“Didn’t my dad literally tell you to come inside whenever you wanted?”
“And that your mother wants to meet me, yes, he did.”
The apples of James’ cheeks go pink in the night. “So. You can if you want.”
Regulus grips the steering wheel in front of him and frowns, his eyebrows furrowing together. It sounds way too easy when James says it like that. Like it’s natural, like it wouldn’t mean anything, like Regulus could just do what he wants. James, living in a world without consequences, in a world where parents are just your parents and they embarrass you because they can. He can do those things. That jealousy curdles in his gut again, boiling over. There’s jealousy, yes, and there’s also the fear that once Regulus gets a taste, he won’t be able to go back.
“No,” Regulus answers, the word disjointed between his teeth. “No, I don’t think I should.”
In his periphery, James tilts his head forward. “You’re sure? It really isn’t that far.”
“I can’t,” Regulus says before he does something stupid like give in. “I really can’t. At least not yet.”
James considers him for a moment, entrenched in dusk gloom. His hands on the wheel, his mouth saying one thing but his heart saying something completely different. The two melodies clash in painful resonance. Regulus shrinks from him, won’t look at him because that will certainly crumble his self-control. He starts the car with his eyes resolutely avoiding James.
The engine hums. Regulus hunches over the wheel but doesn’t go.
“Okay, Regulus,” James says eventually. “Not yet.”
They crawl back onto the asphalt, the only car along the quiet road. Regulus doesn’t glance at him the whole way there lest he can’t look away if he does.