James is currently staring at the ceiling, wondering how much someone could possibly experience in one lifetime. Yes, obviously Sirius and Regulus hated their parents but that doesn’t erase the pain and grief the boys feel now that they are gone. He stayed with Sirius all day after the call came in that morning. He hopes that Remus has more success getting his best friend to open up, although he highly doubts that Sirius will be ready to do that for a bit. His first thought after Sirius told him the news was ‘thank god’, and then James realized that was incredibly fucked up and morbid. He could detest those poor excuses for parents as much as he wanted to in private, but right now he just needs to be a support beam for his best friend as well as said best friend's brother if possible. Sirius immediately called Regulus to tell him he was coming over but Pandora picked up and said Regulus wanted to be alone. It took a bit of convincing but after a bit Sirius reluctantly respected his brother's wishes. James has been worried sick all day for the younger boy.
A knock on the flat's door interrupts his thoughts. He gets up and opens it. Grey eyes meet his own.
“Regulus?”
“Can I come in?”
James immediately steps out of the way for the other boy. Of course, Regulus looks positively radiant. James pushes those thoughts aside.
He closes the door behind him.
“Is my brother home?” Regulus asks, his voice shaking a bit.
“He’s at Remus’ flat, but I can get him if you want or nee-”
“No, I’m not here to see him.”
James is confused. Why is he there then? Not that James is complaining at all.
A beat passes. Regulus steps towards James while taking off his coat and tosses it on the coat rack while keeping eye contact.
Another beat passes. Another step.
“I know it’s a stupid question but, how are you? I can’t imagine how difficult this may be.” James asks as gently as he can.
“Better now hopefully.” Regulus responds.
Regulus places his hands on James' chest and suddenly they’re kissing. It’s not quite rough but not quite soft. James can’t quite place it. What he does know is that it feels wrong. He pulls away and Regulus looks extremely confused and a bit agitated.
“What? Was it not good or something?” His eyebrows furrowed.
“No, it was great! I just don’t think this is the best thing to do right now considering…” James trails off.
Regulus scoffs and takes a step back.
“I’m not some fragile thing you’ll break, James”
James knows that Regulus knows using his actual name instead of ‘Potter’ makes James very happy. Still, James will not succumb.
“Regulus, love, you just lost your parents. I know you aren’t fragile, but-”
“But what? This arrangement didn’t include you being my fucking shrink last time I checked. You know what I’m here for.” He bites out.
James sighs.
“Regulus, you are emotionally vulnerable right now. You can try to deny it, but you know that you aren’t in a sound state of mind. I don’t think you can properly consent to this.” James tries explaining.
“But I need this!” Regulus sounds a bit desperate, and it breaks James’ heart. He looks down at the ground and crosses his arms, looking uncomfortable in the fact that he’s nearly begging.
“Look Regulus, I’d rather you hate me right now for this than you hating me in the future for taking advantage of you.”
It’s silent for a moment before James hears sniffling. Regulus lifts his gaze from the floor back to James. His grey eyes filled with tears. James has never once seen Regulus cry, but this sight alone makes James want to do everything in his power to prevent it from ever happening again. He knows that it’s impossible, but the way Regulus looks right now causes such an ache in his heart he didn’t know was possible.
“I need to be touched.” Regulus chokes out a barely audible whisper, as if it was some shameful secret.
In an instant James closes the space between them and wraps Regulus in a gentle embrace. James feels the other boy tense for a moment before he absolutely melts into it. James kisses the top of his head as Regulus starts his quiet sobs. They stay like that for a few minutes before Regulus pulls back and wipes his tears.
“Sorry.” He looks embarrassed.
“Don’t be silly, you have nothing to apologize for.” James replies with a gentle smile.
He holds out his hand. Regulus raises his eyebrows in confusion, eyes flickering from James hand to his eyes, he hesitantly takes it. James leads them to his bedroom and closes the door behind him. He then lets go of the other boy's hand and goes to rummage through his dresser drawers.
James turns around and hands Regulus one of his t-shirts and some pj shorts. Despite his confusion, Regulus takes them.
“If those are too big I can always go get something from Sirius’ room. I’ll be right back.” James exits and gives Regulus privacy to change. It’s not like James hasn’t seen him undressed before, but he’s making sure to not assume that Regulus is comfortable with it in this situation.
James makes his way to the kitchen and grabs two mugs. One is red and has Spider-Man on it, which is obviously for James. The other looks like Van Gogh’s ‘Starry Night’, but what makes it even more perfect for Regulus is the black cat on it.
He grabs the milk, cocoa powder, sugar, a few other ingredients and gets to work. Halfway through he hears Regulus enter and sit in the breakfast room. James looks over at the other boy and has to remember how to breathe again. He decides it should be law that Regulus can only wear James' clothes for the foreseeable future. They look a tad bit ridiculous just because of how large they are on him, but James adores it. Regulus is fidgeting with the hem of the shirt, seemingly anxious.
As soon as the hot cocoa is done he pours it in the mugs he set out, giving Regulus a bit more than him. James gets out the whip cream and layers it on the drinks. He then pulls out the mini marshmallows he knows Reg loves and puts them on top. He grabs the mugs and makes his way to where Regulus is sitting.
“Careful, it might be a bit hot. I don’t know about you but I personally always burn my tongue.” James sets Regulus’ mug in front of him.
Regulus looks taken aback for a moment. He then picks up the drink, he smiles softly when he takes a good look at the mug. He wants to take a picture and frame it, that smile may just be James’ proudest achievement.
“Thanks.” Regulus says rather sheepishly.
“Of course. I hope you like the mug, I saw it and immediately was reminded of you so I just had to get it. You can keep it if you want.”
There was the tiniest hint of pink sweeping Regulus’ face.
They drink their hot cocoa in comfortable silence. James cleans up and leads Regulus back to the room. He pulls back his sheets and scoots to the other side of the bed, leaving the other side open. Regulus looks confused, so James pats as a gesture for him to get in.
“I thought you said we weren’t going to?” Regulus inquires, he doesn’t really sound all that eager to do any ’activities’ anymore.
“We aren’t, don’t worry.” James gives a warm smile. Regulus looks even more confused but hesitantly gets in the bed.
James scoots a couple inches to get closer to him, Regulus inches towards him a bit. He turns towards the other boy and pulls him in, putting his arm around him.
“What are you doing?” Regulus doesn’t sound upset, just unsure of what is happening.
“We’re cuddling. You said you needed to be touched, right?”
“Oh, right.”
“Is this okay? We can stop if you want.” James wants to make sure Regulus is as comfortable as he can be.
“It’s nice, just unexpected. I..” Regulus pauses. “I like it.” He says quietly, and leans into James’ touch.
James uses one of his hands to run his fingers through Reg’s curls. Regulus really leans into that one. They stay like that for a while, just existing with each other. James' body warmth radiates off of him, which he knows Regulus likes. He imagines what this would be like for real, if they could be like this all the time. Of course James likes the ‘benefits’ they have, but he would take an actual relationship with Reg over sex any day.
He wants to show Regulus that love can be gentle for the rest of his life.
“I’m sorry about earlier.” Regulus sheepishly says, James turns his head to look at him but Regulus is intentionally avoiding eye contact.
“What on Earth do you have to be sorry for?” James says a bit incredulously. He can’t imagine what Regulus had convinced himself he did wrong this time.
“I don’t want to just use you for sex and with how I acted earlier I just don’t want you assuming that.”
“Love, you really have nothing to apologize for. You have a lot going on, I get it.” James kisses the top of Regulus’ head. He loves seeing the faint blush that appears on his face.
They sit in the comfortable silence for a few moments longer before Regulus speaks again.
“I didn’t know this was an option.” He all but whispers.
“Didn’t know what was an option?” James looks at him in mild confusion.
“This? Non-sexual physical intimacy, I guess?” Regulus looks back to him. James can tell the other boy is on the verge of falling asleep.
“Well now you know, that's all that matters.” He smiles. “I mean not that I’m opposed to the sex part just not right now.” He says with a soft chuckle.
Regulus sleepily blinks and smiles.
“Don’t need sex, just need you.” Regulus kisses James on the cheek before nuzzling into his neck.
James is internally screaming. Does Regulus understand how much that sentence means to James? Does he mean it in the way James hopes? It keeps him up for a bit, so he eventually hears the other boys breathing even out, which lets James know he fell asleep. As much as James would love to overthink about this, sleep is quickly overtaking him as well. He drifts off with a smile on his face.
“Ahem.”
James, still 95% asleep, stirs a bit.
“Ahem.”
“Jesus Pads what time is it?” He grumbles.
Wait.
James’ eyes open to see his best friend sitting at the edge of the bed. Well shit. He checks to check if Regulus is awake, luckily he’s still fast asleep looking rather angelic. God he’s so pretty.
“Care to explain?” Oh right, Sirius is here.
“He needed to be held.”
Sirius is visibly caught off guard.
“What?” He asks, eyebrows furrowed in confusion.
“He told me he needed to be touched, so I’ve just been holding him. He cried a bit, okay not a bit he actually cried quite a lot, but I held him through it and then I made him hot cocoa and then well..” James explains and then gestures to Regulus sleeping. Sirius is quiet for a moment.
“He.. he told you he needed to be touched? And it wasn't in your usual hook up way?” James' jaw drops.
“You knew?” He asks, trying to keep his volume low in order to not wake Regulus.
“Prongs, I’ve known for a while.” Sirius rolls his eyes.
“How?” Is all James can get out.
“I found your favorite Spiderman t-shirt along with a couple of other things in his flat a month ago. I was trying to find the sweater he stole from me-“
“Which you stole from Moony.” James interrupts.
“And found your stuff.” He continues. “I wasn’t happy about it in the slightest but Regulus has been happier lately so I decided you would get to live another day.”
“Look Pads I’m sorry I really am but you need to know I really like him.” James sighs.
“So you’re dating?” Sirius raises an eyebrow.
James looks away.
“Well, no. He doesn’t like me like that I don’t think, but I need you to know I don’t have malicious intentions-“ he’s cut off by Sirius laughing. Regulus stirs a little bit and nuzzles even closer to James, who promptly shushes his best friend.
“Doesn’t like you? James, how on Earth did you come to that conclusion?” Sirius asks incredulously.
“Well it’s just hooking up for him, or at least it was.” James replies
Sirius fake gags. “Never talk about hooking up with my brother in front of me again if you want to continue breathing. Look, Regulus is absolute shit at talking about feelings. He also doesn’t normally accept physical touch like this. He might not be saying it but mate, he’s definitely a goner for you.”
James swears he could feel his heart growing. Regulus likes him. Holy shit.
“But just to be clear you didn’t …. last night, right? Because I will kill you.” Sirius is sending him a death glare.
“God no, Padfoot. He was a wreck. He came over cause he wanted to but I told him it wouldn’t be right in his state of mind.” James hurries to reassure his friend.
Sirius lets out a sigh of relief.
“This is another reason why I let you keep living, if it were anyone else I don’t think they would’ve known how to deal with this situation properly.” Sirius gives a soft smile as he looks at his brother, and then back to James. “I’m glad he has you, Prongs. You seem like you’re good for him, really good.”
Sirius gets up and walks over to the side of the bed, reaching out and ruffling his brother's hair a bit. He then winks at James and exits the room.
James wonders if that really just happened. Sirius is okay with it. Regulus may genuinely like him? His head is swarming with thoughts and questions when Regulus stirs a bit, his eyes opening slowly.
“Hey love, you sleep okay?” James asks.
Regulus blinks a couple times and nods his head. James thinks this is what he’s like to see for the rest of his life. Regulus in his bed, in his clothes, in his arms, blinking away sleep and looking absolutely adorable. He gets a small smile on his face before he looks up at James and gives him a quick peck on the lips.
He didn’t care what happened, all James knew is that he would cherish this moment with all of his heart until his last breath.
James and Regulus start spending much more time together. James doesn’t think it would be beneficial to start a relationship while Regulus is still grieving, so they take things slow. After enough time has passed they decide to become official, they end up going on double dates with Sirius and Remus which is mainly just James and Remus fawning over their respective lovers for the entirety of the dates.
In the end, James gets what he wants. To see Regulus in their bed, his clothes, in his arms.