The Loss Of Friends You Didn’t Have
Regulus's POV
A thing Regulus started to realise was that his life was nothing but a double-edged sword.
His life was good; good grades, good classes, nice teachers. His life was bad; bad parents, bad choices, worse brother.
Whenever Regulus got this anxious, he smoked. That and writing letters were his only coping mechanisms he couldn’t really abandon. The letter-solution was like a diary he wrote when his feelings were getting too overwhelming, and the smoking was just a way to calm himself. As soon as the smoke ran through his teeth, he’d forget everything else for a second. Honestly, he blamed Sirius for that habit. He was the one sneaking muggle stuff into their house, basically openly inviting Regulus to try them out by hiding them in plain sight.
Back in the 60’s, smoking was taken as an elegant thing, something gentlemen and business people did. Now it was disgusting, filthy, for people on the street — and Regulus, apparently.
The thing was, he was now sitting in the Great Hall and lighting up a cigarette would have probably been just a little unprofessional of him. He sat next to Pandora at the Ravenclaw table, and at least here he could avoid James, Barty, Evan and Sirius.
Great, the year hadn’t even properly started and Regulus had managed to cause more drama than he intended to.
He glanced over to the Gryffindor table. James was smiling at Sirius, though his eyes seemed to flicker searchingly to the Slytherin table every now and then. Barty sat at the Slytherin table, as guessed (he would probably rather die than sit anywhere but there) and had a conversation with Evan, though he didn't seem to be very interested in it either.
Regulus sighed and turned back to Pandora. “So you sent it out?” she asked again, poking her food like it was jelly.
Regulus nodded. “Unfortunately. Well, technically Kreacher did but that doesn’t really change anything now, does it? Also I am completely over him, by the way. That was a silly, stupid little crush built on delusion and fantasy, nothing real,” he assured himself out loud rather than answering her properly.
“And then you... yelled at James ‘cause he wanted to clear everything out between you two?” Pandora asked, already knowing the answer to it.
Regulus buried his face in his hands and groaned before looking at Pandora sternly. “Okay, look-“
“Looking,” Pandora said, clearing her throat, putting away her fork and sitting up straight. Regulus found this a tad too dramatic but he took it anyway.
He shrugged. “Potter annoyed me. Did I mention that he kept running after me like a dog?”
“You did. Multiple times, actually,” she said, smiling knowingly. Regulus shook his head.
”Okay, doesn’t matter. The thing is, that idiot is Sirius’s best friend. My,” Regulus stopped, shuddering in disgust before he continued talking, “‘crush’ on him was stupid and, most importantly, not real. I was jealous of their friendship but that’s over now and frankly, I couldn’t give two shits about that guy. He’s one of hundreds of students here and just happens to have a best friend, who just happens to be my brother. I don’t know more about him and, honestly, I don’t want to know him. And yes, I had to yell at him ‘cause he wouldn’t leave me alone.”
Pandora nodded, patting Regulus on the shoulder. “Fine,” she sighed. Then she picked up her fork again and once again, started poking her food. After a minute of silence, she asked confused, “Why did you even put an address on the letter if you didn’t want it to get out?” And now that was a question Regulus didn’t have an answer to.
“Well...” he began. “At least I didn’t put a stamp on it?”
Pandora chuckled quietly as she held a finger over her mouth to swallow her food before she spoke. “Okay then. What are you going to do? You can’t run away forever, at some point you’ll have to talk to him. And Barty and Evan. You guys share a dorm, in case you don’t remember that.” Regulus rolled his eyes. He did remember. He was only seconds away from asking if he could stay at Pandora’s tonight, when he felt someone tap him on his shoulder. As he turned around, he looked directly at… Lupin?
“Can I talk to you?” Regulus thought about saying no to him but that might just be plainly rude — and Regulus was definitely not the nicest person on earth but he tried to not be too unfriendly, at least to people who didn’t deserve him being snarky.
“Alright,” Regulus mumbled, standing up from the bench and looking back at Pandora. “See you later?” She nodded and shooed them off. She looked after them curiously and Regulus turned around to shrug at her.
Soon enough, Regulus wished he would have said no. Remus and him were standing alone in an abandoned corridor and Remus seemed to be so nervous that he didn’t know where to look. “Okay, so, I don’t really know what’s going on, but no one’s telling me so I thought I’d ask you.” He paused, probably waiting for a response from Regulus. When that didn’t come, he continued, taking another breath. “I know we don’t really know each other, and you probably have a lot of assumptions about me after Sirius and I—,” he gulped, “broke up, but if you’re aware of what’s happening, just tell me please.” Another pause. Regulus was getting a little impatient here. “Okay, do you know… what’s been going on with James and you? I’m not saying you’re involved in any way in what’s been happening, but he’s been acting so strange! More than usual. And it always happened when you were around, so… Do you know anything? Please, James is sort of holding this group together so if now he’s falling apart as well, I don’t know, I don’t think we’ll make it much longer.”
He rattled everything off like he practiced it for hours before this. Regulus just looked at him in distress for a second, then he took a short breath in, and said,
“No.”
He turned around to leave, but the Gryffindor was apparently so desperate that he grabbed Regulus by the arm, already pleading again. It seemed Lupin must’ve lost his goddamn mind, touching Regulus like that. “Please, Regulus, you know something. You gotta, ‘cause—”
“It has nothing to do with you. Doesn’t concern you, doesn’t threaten your fun little friend group, and it definitely isn’t enough to whine to me about your problems, alright? Now let me go.” He emphasised the last few words each by themselves, thinking it might add some scary effect.
It must’ve, ‘cause Lupin immediately let go of him. Regulus muttered something under his breath as he turned around and left the older boy standing alone in the corridor, probably more lost than he was before their ‘talk’, if you could even call it that.
He was aware that what he said was sort of a lie, but he didn’t care for that. He didn’t know Lupin much, other than him being Sirius’ ex boyfriend, Regulus had no information on him whatsoever. He didn’t interest him, he didn’t empathise with him, and he certainly wouldn’t help him just because he told him a little son story. Oh, boo hoo your friend group is falling apart. So is mine. And do you see me whining about it to a stranger?
Regulus stopped dead in his tracks. Weird. He never really acknowledged that fact. But it didn’t matter which way he tried to look at it—it was, undeniably so, a fact that his friend group was falling apart. That was a strange thing to think about. When they all met in their first year on the train, Regulus was this clumsy shy kid with the obnoxious and loud bother of a sibling who brought shame upon the house of Black by being a Gryffindor. Barty was the son of the Minister, but for someone so involved in politics, the kid didn’t know how the world worked at all. He had no survival skills whatsoever, and even to an 11-year-old Regulus who basically lacked any human empathy, even that was concerning. And Evan was a relative, a cousin Regulus never met who his parents told him to ‘find and get associated with as soon as you get there!’. He wasn’t as well-mannered as their parents had made it out to be. For a child, he cursed a whole lot and knew way too many curses and hexes to be mentally well.
All in all, the three made a rather interesting group of friends. They weren’t alike at all, but Regulus always thought that as they got older, they grew more similar. They sort of had to—having the same life, basically. Same classes, same friends, same family situations. Everything was just very interchangeable with one another.
So it was strange, seeing them drift apart from each other now. Regulus always guessed that would happen once they would leave Hogwarts. They would all have their own lives, catching up only once a week, and then that’d turn into once a month, then only on special occasions like a birthday or Sirius’ statistically plausible premature funeral. It was a natural thing to lose the people you knew in school. Regulus just didn’t expect them to fade away in school, while they were still always around each other.
Regardless of whether he liked it or not, it looked like it wasn’t up to Regulus if they would stay friends or not. He sighed, and kept walking towards the big doors of the Great Hall.
As soon as he reached them, they suddenly swung open and a horde of students went in all directions. Regulus quickly found sight of Pandora and walked to her through the masses. “You okay?” she asked, speaking loudly over the noises surrounding them. “Yeah!” Regulus yelled back. She gave him a quick thumbs up as they walked towards the stairs.
And that’s when Regulus felt it. The tension behind him, a shiver on his spine. There was someone staring at him. He leaned over to Pandora as they kept walking and whispered, “Dora, could you unobtrusively turn around and look if someone’s staring at us?”
Pandora nodded and just stopped walking entirely to turn around. Very unobtrusive, thanks Dora.
She turned back around and they started walking again. “It’s Evan.” Great. “He stopped walking when we stopped walking so I’m guessing that it’s him.” Regulus started walking faster. “Hey!” Pandora called after him.
“Dora, you go to your brother. ‘kay? I think I need some time alone anyway.”
“Okay,” she said understandingly, slowing down to let Evan catch up with her. Regulus heard her greet him before he walked around a corner and went into the nearest bathroom he could find — it was the abandoned girl’s bathroom he used to hide in when he was younger. Regulus sat down on the floor next to the door and rested his head on the wall behind him. He knew that if he was quiet enough, Moaning Myrtle wouldn’t notice him.
He needed to find a way to convince his friends that he was over Barty.