hockey season - week 5
When James came to school the day after the game, his voice was gone again.
"Think I'm gonna fail maths," James said, pausing his sentence to cough again. "Professor called on me today and- cough - the whole class was arguing about- cough- if the answer was 14 or 15 - cough - I got 407." James struggled through his story, his friends laughing briefly as his throat continued to ache.
"Seriously James, you should get that checked out, why are you always sick?" Remus started after James finally stopped coughing and everyone stopped laughing at the experience.
"Maybe you have asthma or you're just running way too hard," Peter suggested as he sat down at the lunch table.
"Oh yeah, I read that if you are panting and short of breath a lot, it can mess up your throat for long periods of time." Lily continued.
Suddenly, Remus stiffened. That was it. He had figured it out.
The Slytherins were talking about panic attacks, and that would make James be out of breath a lot, and that's why his throat is always sore. He turned to James with his discovery but kept it to himself. He couldn't call him out without planning it first and if he was deflecting it so hard, he was not going to be easy to bring it up to. He turned to Sirius, in hopes there was a chance that the other boy had somehow magically figured out the same thing at the same time. Sirius turned with confusion at his stare and Remus tried to hide his blush.
"Nah I don't have asthma, it's just like a lingering cold." James insisted, and everyone moved on. Everyone except for Remus. His best friend was struggling, why didn't he tell him? Or at least tell Sirius. He figured it would be best to not mention it just yet, but continue to observe it to see if there were more signs he had missed.
He considered telling Sirius, but ultimately decided against it as it was a private matter. He'll probably have to tell his friends soon, but Remus knows that once he tells them, it's not even close to a secret anymore. And Sirius will not take the situation lightly and Peter is somehow an even worse secret keeper than Sirius and he'll have the entire team and all of the girls roped in on it in no time, which will only make James feel even worse.
-
The Elite Hogwarts team scrimmage that night was exactly as McGonagall said it would be- tough. Both sides were playing as aggressive as ever, checking and calling out to each other, the separation of skill was even. The score was still 0-0 halfway through. James was doing okay, keeping his anxiety in, but of course it didn't help that his throat killed and he was coughing and wheezing regularly.
"Hey James, hows your throat feeling? I remember that little detail after your panic attacks. Must've been a bad night, huh?" Barty started, and although James could usually keep his anger under control, he couldn't. He lunged at Barty, who tried to avoid the check but James got to him first. Instead of taking it like a normal player, James had been taking significantly worse checks from them all season, Barty slid to the ground pretending to be in pain. James remembered this trick. Barty would always get away with it. As he lay on the ground wailing that James hit him, he winked at James before getting up with ease after the whistle was blown.
"Potter! Come on! Two minutes in the box. You know better than to fight dirty!" Coach Binns yelled. James tried not to let it get to him, but he could never handle being yelled at. Especially when it was for fighting back as he was always afraid of hurting someone and would never hit someone hard enough to break them.
James sat in the penalty box with his combination of pent-up rage and anxiety. Now, he couldn't keep any Slytherins from saying anything or doing anything to his teammates, and he was in trouble with his coaches. Maybe even benched, which will add to his anxiety and to the bullying.
McGonagall had come to this scrimmage, too. Her work was pretty light recently, so she took advantage of the time off. He could see the coach from across the rink making knowing eye contact with him. Then his eyes panned over to Frank, who leaned into the glass with his arm in a cast and his Gryffindor Hockey jacket, looking interested in the game despite an obvious undertone of disappointment. And he didn't even know it was James' fault. The next thing he saw was Amos, who appeared to be Evan's next target, taking multiple shoves in the last few minutes. Amos looked up and saw James, then looked back to Frank, then back to the game.
Somewhere during this time McGonagall had come closer to him, looking at him cautiously. James shook his head, the panic rising in his chest. He couldn't let anyone see him, but he sat in a small clear glass box. He needed out, his breathing quickened and once again he couldn't breathe. Then she was at the door of the box; she'd come from around the rink. She saw him. She knew. And although James couldn't make out what she was saying, he knew it was about regulating his breathing. But all James could genuinely focus on was that he was trapped in a small box on display, hyperventilating and shaking. He didn't know how much time was left on his penalty, but it felt like hours.
James threw his stick to the side, both hands at his collar, choked. He was coughing and stuttering on his breathing, small noises of grunts and whimpers escaping his mouth.
"Coach I- "
"Shh, James. It's alright. Just breathe. I'm here."
"No they can't-"
"James. You're not going to get better if you do not stop talking. You know how to stop this, I've seen you do it. You just need to stop thinking about everyone else. You've got it." Minnie's voice was firm but gentle. James slowly started to calm himself down. It was okay. Everyone was still playing, there were no eyes on him.
"Can I go back out now?" James asked, his voice was practically gone.
"Are you sure?"
"Sitting on the bench will be worse for it." James explained. He knew his mind, and he couldn't last another second with just his thoughts. She insisted he get water and take a minute more, then go out. Frank was halfway around the rink with James' water in hand, but James couldn't focus on how he had a nice person from his other team helping him, he could only notice how this meant Frank knows what's going on.
He broke out into a new, slightly less energized round of wheezes before Frank arrived. "James, it's okay. We all make mistakes and you didn't actually hurt him." He spoke softly, which was strangely worse than his usual experience of yelling. God, he hated being seen as weak.
"I'm fine," he whispered, no voice or energy left.
"James..."
"Please, promise me you won't mention this to anybody. At all." He rasped. Frank hesitated before nodding. So he went back out and was relieved to see that no one on the ice had paid attention to him while he was off.
"What'd McGonagall say to you? Get in trouble?" Marlene asked. This meant she hadn't seen the conversation at all. James sighed, relieved.
"Yeah, just told me to not fight like them. I didn't though, I just checked him." James said through his breaking voice, but Marlene just nodded and most likely just pretended to ignore the recent loss of voice from James.
-
The scrimmage finished and everyone came off the ice. None of the coaches had anything to say so all of the players left without another word.
"Man, coaches were not happy with you." Xenophilous noted to James and this was the first time James had ever spoken to him which resulted in his only impression of the boy to a hatred for what he wanted to talk about.
"I know, I've never seen a coach call someone out, yell at you, and then go over and talk to you while in the box." Pandora added.
"Yeah, they were mad... but it's fine." James mumbled back. He just wanted to get out of there before facing Binns. He couldn't look him in the face after what McGonagall had told him. Binns and Slughorn are old and very old-fashioned in all aspects - coaching and beliefs. He was not going to take hearing that one of his players "had anxiety". And even more importantly, Slughorn is the team USA coach, he has seen James through all of the terrible times he experienced during the past few seasons.
"Well, next time don't go out of your way to hurt someone," Barty added with a fake limp. James would have pointed out that he hit his arm not his leg, had he not been spending the conversation trying to silently cough out another wheeze, this time not from the sore throat.
"You're actually joking, right?" Marlene asked rhetorically as she gestured to Frank who still sat on a bench by the rink trying to hold a bag, a water, and his phone all in his one uninjured hand.
-
Regulus had been quiet during this game. He typically was on the ice, but tonight it was much worse. Regulus had been focused, paying all of his attention solely to the game as best he could so he wouldn't have to partake in the bullying game created by his teammates, until something caught his attention- something he couldn’t ignore.
James.
He was in the penalty box, his back hunched in a way that was unnatural for anyone but a player exhausted from the game. But this wasn’t exhaustion, it was something far worse. James was visibly shaking, his hands clutching at the neckline of his jersey, his breath coming in short, ragged bursts. Regulus almost wanted skate over and help him, but he knew he could never do such a thing while the sight of him like this struck Regulus with a kind of gut-wrenching familiarity.
Thankfully, two people went over to help him and Regulus tried to get the vision out of his head. His face pale, eyes wide with fear. His breathing quickened even further, chest heaving as he looked out onto the ice, his body completely tense.
It wasn't until after the game when he saw James still recovering in the locker room that a flashback hit him like a wave, a jolt that sent him back in time. He was in the USA rink, a few years younger, watching James skate cautiously along the edge of the ice, always hovering at the edges of the group. The way James had been then, so careful, so anxious around physical contact, especially with his teammates was unfortunately not much different than how he was now.
But Regulus could remember the panic, the way James would freeze up when a hit in practice went wrong or even more when the words of his teammates got a little too loud. How his face would flush with distress, his hands shaking as if he couldn’t breathe.
Then he recalled the night they’d argued.
James was pacing, his hands tugging desperately at his helmet, struggling to remove it, his face drawn with panic. Regulus stood nearby, watching, frustrated before he understood what he was facing.
“James, it’s- it's just a game! Why are you making this so difficult?” Regulus had asked, trying to keep his voice steady, though it cracked at the end.
“I'm not!" He hiccuped. They stepped off the ice and James slumped onto the bench. "I can't just pretend I can't hear them, it's not that easy."
"Then, check them back, check me back for all I care! You've fought back before, really hard! Why can't you just do that again or take it?"
I can’t!” James had snapped back, his voice trembling. “As much as I hate them, I can't just hurt them... I'm sorry," he continued, voice going to a whisper, his voice fragile, as if the words themselves were too heavy to bear. "I just—I can’t stand the idea of hurting anyone. Not even by accident."
Regulus exhaled, his own breath sharp. He nodded, understanding the fear all too well though not knowing how it was affecting this aspect of his life. "James, listen to me," he said gently, leaning closer. "You're not going to hurt anyone, okay? Not like you think. People get hurt in games, sure, but it’s never on purpose. You don't have to carry that weight."
James flinched slightly, the words hanging in the air like an invisible wall between them. His eyes darted toward the ice, his gaze unfocused. He didn’t speak for a moment, but when he did, his voice was low, almost inaudible.
"I hurt you, though."
The words cut through Regulus, sharp and unexpected. He froze for a moment, unsure of how to respond. It had been a long time since they’d talked about that- the first time they’d tried to be more than just teammates. "What are you talking about?" Regulus asked quietly, trying to keep the edge from his voice. "You didn’t hurt me."
James shook his head, his lips trembling. "I... I couldn’t be with you, Regulus. Because I was so afraid of hurting you. Not on the ice, but... with us. I couldn't be the one to mess things up. To make you feel like I was too much, or..." He paused, swallowing hard. "What if I hurt you more than just physically? What if I hurt you inside? I couldn’t do that. I couldn’t risk it."
Regulus felt a pang in his chest, the memory of that night- the fight that had fractured something between them- surfacing too painfully to ignore. He had tried to understand. He had tried to make James see that it wasn’t about the fear of hurting him, but about something deeper, something James hadn’t been able to confront. But hearing James admit it now, hearing the weight of that old fear spilling out like this, left Regulus speechless for a moment.
"You think you would have hurt me?" Regulus asked quietly, eyes locking onto James’ pained expression.
James' shoulders slumped as he nodded, eyes avoiding Regulus’ gaze. "I don’t trust myself not to. It’s why I pulled away. It’s why I couldn’t let us be together. I was too scared that whatever I did- whatever I said, or how I acted- it would hurt you. And I... I couldn’t stand it. I couldn’t handle the idea of being the one to break you."
It was the third time they’d had this fight, the third time James had turned away from him, had refused to even let their hands meet when they were alone. The third time he had looked at Regulus with those wide, apologetic eyes that made Regulus’ heart ache in ways he didn’t know how to describe whilst equally filling him with unwanted rage.
James had a fear of hurting people. That was the truth of it, wasn’t it? It wasn’t just the hockey hits or the scrimmages that had made him freeze, it was everything. His constant need to protect everyone- to the point where it tore him apart. He couldn’t bear the idea of causing pain, even if it was accidental, and that fear had kept him from being able to open up, to let anyone in.
And Regulus had seen it. He had understood it, at least, he thought he had. He tried to be patient, to hold back, but he was hurt, too. Hurt that James couldn’t love him the way he wanted, the way they both secretly wished for. But even more, he wouldn't even try.
“I’m not fragile,” Regulus had said softly, trying to make his point clear. “I’m not made of glass, James. I’m not going to break just because you... you might hurt me.”
“I’m sorry,” James had whispered, voice breaking. “But I can’t- can’t do it. I just can’t be the one to cause you pain. I-”
“We haven't done anything, I think you're forgetting." James looked up at the sudden annoyance in Regulus' voice. He'd held it in as long as he could, but the way James continued to speak resulted in a loss of his temper. "You aren't so special, I'm not dying without you. The only problem I have with this situation is that you can't decide if you want to have something or not. So make up your mind, and more specifically, just call it quits at this point."
The memory snapped back into the present, and Regulus blinked, his hands clenched tightly around the shaft of his stick as he approached the locker room door. Since the team was just a little too big to share one locker room, the Slytherins still used their own. He pretended he hadn't just fully relieved one of the worst moments of his life. So he packed his things up, heading out towards the door again, until suddenly Snape called out, "Jamsie, what are you doing over here?!" And all of the boys crowded around the hallway.