Poisoned Youth

Platform Nine and three quarters was crowded as usual around this time of the year. Goodbyes were rushed, suitcases were stacked into storage compartments, fathers waved and mothers cried. The new students with their big eyes stepped on the train for the first time. Evan took a deep breath and the smell of coal filled his lungs. At this point, he usually felt like coming home. The familiarity of the platform should’ve caught up to him by now. But Evan was still shaking from yesterday evening’s events. Pandora hurried alongside him in the direction of the nearest door to the train. She took three steps while he took one.

“I swear to god, Evan, if you don’t tell me right now what is up with you I’m going to hex you!” His sister promised under her breath.

They entered the train and walked straight down the row of compartments. Evan pushed open the door of an empty one.
They sat down on opposite sides.

“What is up with you, Evan? Seriously, I’m worried? What happened at that dinner? Why wasn’t I allowed to join?” Her voice carried honest worry.

“It’s nothing. Just about school. Father wasn’t as pleased with last year’s grades.” He didn’t look at her while he spoke.

“We both know that’s a lie, Ev. And I’m losing my nerves over here. I am your sister. You’re supposed to tell me everything! You’ve been such an arse lately!” Pandora rarely lost her temper but she cared deeply for her brother and wanted to protect him at all costs.

“Oi! Since when is our Panda in such a mood?” The door slit open again. “That time of the month again, huh?”

“Crouch.” Pandora noted, fairly unmoved.

“Oh come on! Ain’t I allowed to joke? You know you’re my favorite Rosier.” Barty chuckled.

Then he turned to Evan, and there was something in his chest, he couldn’t quite put his finger on, that stung when those brown eyes met his.

“Nice to see you too, Barty.” He tried, but failed to contain the excitement in his voice. He had missed his best friend over the summer.

“Oh, just kidding, hun. You know I love you.” Barty winked and then sat down next to Pandora.

Evan could feel a wave of heat creeping up his cheeks, but he was saved by the compartment door opening all over again.

“That moron!” Regulus’ voice was as grim and stiff as always. At least that hadn’t changed, Evan thought to himself.

“Why the hell are you covered in mud?” Barty asked, raising his eyebrow.

“That idiot brother of mine with his stupid superiority complex pushed me into the herbalogy project of a second year.” The boy groaned.

With a wisk of his wand he cleaned his robes and sat down next to Evan.

“So, what did you do?” You could hear that Pandora wasn’t sure she even wanted to know.

“Hexed them both, of course.” He replied without a second thought.

“Of course.” Pandora replied dryly.

“You go Reg. Those stupid Gryffindoors deserve it for all I care.” Barty got comfortable in his seat.

Sirius Black was Regulus’ older brother. They weren’t much alike. Or maybe they were too much alike. Evan hadn’t quite decided on that. They had the same greyish blue eyes and the same black curls, though, Regulus’s were a fair bit shorter than Sirius’s. The brothers couldn’t be in the same room for the split of a moment without almost causing a civil war. Evan for his part, found it quite amusing that all it took for his usually calm friend to lose it was just a glance of his brother. If Evan remembered correctly, it hadn’t always been that way. They used to get along quite well. Better than now anyway.

When the hogwarts express finally arrived in the small town of hogsmeade the moon had already risen and the stars were twinkling above their heads. Evan found it quite romantic, though he kept this thought to himself, fearing his friends would laugh at him if he voiced it.

His trail of thoughts was abruptly interrupted when a rather well eating boy squished his way through the crowd of students. He tripped over a twig and fell.

“Pettigrew! I swear to Merlin if I catch you!” A voice shouted from behind them.

“Here we go…” Pandora whispered next to him.

A disheveled looking Sirius Black pushed his way through the crowd, followed up by James Potter with a boyish smirk on his lips.

“You dirty bastard ate all my chocolate frogs while I was asleep!” The older Black brother pushed further through.

Pettigrew had gotten back up and was about run off when he sprinted head-first into Barty, who, if looks could kill, had jusy left a bloody massacre on the ground. Pettigrew gulped and took a step back when his friends finally caught up to him.

“Looks like you’ve lost your pet, Potter.” Barty snarled.

The smiles were washed out off their faces.

With long, fast steps another boy joined the party. Remus Lupin. A nod in Evan’s direction before he turned to analyse the tensed situation. Rolling his eyes, he stepped in.

Meanwhile, Regulus and his brother were glaring at each other. Potter was just standing there awkwardly. Seemingly not sure what to say or do.

“Hey, Crouch… it wasn’t Pete’s fault. We were just messing around. Right, Pete?”

Pettigrew nodded frantically.

“We have got nothing to apologise for, Prongs. It was just a stupid accident.” Sirius growled.

Evan thought he was going to go feral and bite Regulus.

Lupin stepped behind Sirius and put a hand on his shoulder. A gesture that was so simple, but between them it felt almost electric. Evan couldn’t quite put a finger on why that was.

“We better get going.” With a last glare to his brother, Regulus turned on his heel and strutted away.

Barty followed suit. Evan felt like the whole forest wasn’t enough space for all of those egos. Then, he too turned and followed the path to where the carriages were waiting.

The last warm weeks flew by in what felt like the blink of an eye. Soon the forbidden forest looked foggy and cold without its leaves coloured red and brown. The water of the lake was freezing cold and in mid November it began to snow. The days got shorter and the sun only rarely showed its face from behind the thickly layered clouds.

There was going to be a party, right before the holidays started and most students would leave for their homes. Evan wasn’t particularly keen on going, but Pandora had urged him to go under people a little more. He had this habit of isolating himself from every breathing thing during the cold months. Hiding in his bed and reading piles of books. He didn’t mind but he knew he had his friends worried. Even Regulus had, though very stiffly and obviously very uncomfortable, offered to lend him an ear if he ever needed to talk. Which to be fair, was a way greater gesture as one might first think from his usually rather emotionally distant friend. Barty had tried to cheer him up by telling him the occasional joke, which was his way of showing some kind of affection to him, how Evan assumed.

On the evening of the party, Evan found himself in a crowd of people in the Slytherin common room. He went straight to a table where bottles of colourful looking liquids and glasses were placed. Pouring himself a wild mix of pretty much everything available he scanned the room. He spotted many familiar faces. A group of Ravenclaws from his Potions class, Barty, dancing in the middle if the room, being the center of attention as always, Severus Snape talking to a few people, most likely making himself sound way more important than he was. And to his absolute surprise he spotted right at the door Remus Lupin, James Potter, Sirius Black and the Pettigrew boy. It was unusual, seeing the century long rivalry between the two houses, to see a Gryffindoor at a Slytherin party and, even less unlikely, the other way around. Remus Lupin caught his questioning look across the crowded room and shrugged his shoulders.

The older Black brother was standing close to him, again a little closer than two friends usually did, but nobody seemed to notice except for him. The group seemed to discuss something, which of course Evan couldn’t hear over the noisy crowd. He decided to investigate and walked, glass in his hand, over to greet them.

“Lupin, you’re one of the last people I’d have expected to show up at this party. Or perhaps any party.” He said with a smirk towards the taller boy.

“Rosier.” Remus noted.

“If you’re gonna throw us out, I’ll stop you right there. We were invited.” Black threw in, eying him up and down.

Evan would be the last person in this room to throw anyone out. He was simply curious why of all people a group of Gryffindoors who weren’t only well known but also well disliked by the whole house of Slytherin would show up at this gathering. But Evan had to admit that the fact that they were invited caught him by surprise, so he decided to push further.

“Really?” He raised an eyebrow at his friend’s brother. “By whom?”

“Severus Snape.” Potter said.

Now that really was surprising. Snape and this particular group of Gryffindoors had a history of feuds and plots, everyone in their year knew that. Something involving Potter and a red haired Gryffindoor girl. He didn’t knew nor cared to much about this drama, but knew for a fact that something was up if Snape had invited them. Evan would ask him about it later.

“Interesting.” Evan said halfheartedly. “I’ll leave you to it then.”

After Evan had drowned the first cup of whatever, he went to get a second. This many people weren’t endurable without any alcoholic influence. Evan liked the way his brain would go quiet for just a little. Minutes went by, or maybe hours, where he would just stand there and watch the crowd. He couldn’t remember exactly why, but he decided to go and look for Barty. He hadn’t seen him in a while. He opened the door to their dorm and immediately froze.

Barty was practically devouring the face of a Slytherin girl from a year above them. Barty’s hands were wrapped around her hips and hers were tangled up in his hair. There were small gasps and groans. Neither of them looked up or even acknowledged his presence. All of sudden Evan felt sick in his stomach. He closed the door shut and walked out of the hallway into the common room where he pushed his way towards the exit to get some fresh air.

The halls of Hogwarts were empty and quiet. Evan immediately felt the tension in his body ease up.

For a while he just wandered the stone tiled halls. He decided to sit down on the last step of a stairway leading up to the bathrooms. He placed his head atop of his hands on his knees, trying to stop his surroundings from spinning. Something about that image of Barty and this girl had him quite shaken. He wasn’t sure he would’ve known where that stinging feeling in his gut came from sober, and he definitely didn’t know where it came from in his current state.

There was a noise of hushed voices a little further down the hall. Without a second thought, Evan got up and walked toward it.

The voices came from behind a stone pillar.

“Are you sure nobody’s going to see us here?” Evan knew that voice from somewhere but he couldn’t tell who it belonged to right now.

“I am. I double checked. We’re safe.”

“Good.” The first voice responded.

There was a moment of silence and then he could hear a small gasping sound. He walked around the pillar to find a very startled Remus Lupin leaning over the face of an even more startled Sirius Black. The boys were tangled up in each other. Black’s back against the wall.

“What the hell, Rosier!” Remus jumped at the sight of him. He let go of Sirius in his arms and straightened his tie.

Black was quiet. Eyes wide open in terror.

“Did I interrupt…” Evan felt dizzy again. “Were you two…Did you?… I saw you kiss.”

Remus spoke first, a low, serious voice. “You cannot, under any circumstances tell anyone, you hear me? Please, Evan, I am asking you, no, actually I am begging you to not tell anyone. Not even your friends. I’ll do whatever you ask, just please don’t tell anyone.”

Evan’s thoughts were too slow for him. Why would he tell? What was so bad about…? They were just kissing. No, they were kissing. They were both guys and they kissed. Evan stumbled backwards, but managed to say something. “What’s to tell? It’s none of my business…”

Sirius Black let out a breath he was holding.

“You sure we can trust him? We could just obliviate him.” He proposed.

Remus looked at him, then back at Sirius.
“I think we can. He’s really not too bad.”

“Please don’t mess with my head.. “ he sighed. “Everyone is always messing with my head.”

His confession was followed by a rather loud burp.

Remus and Sirius looked at each other and shook their heads.

“You’re an idiot Rosier, just like my brother” Sirius rolled his eyes at him, but then, to Evan’s surprise he went to support his right side while Remus went to his left. His arms slung around both of their heads they made their way back to the Slytherin dormitories.

“I don’t wanna go in there.” Evan complained when they arrived at the door of his room. “Barty is hooking up with some girl in there.”

Remus put his head against the door and listened. “I don’t think there’s anybody in there.”

Sirius pushed the door open and as Remus had predicted, nobody was in there.

“Which one’s yours?” Remus asked.

Evan pointed into a vague direction and his best friends’ sworn enemies put him to bed.

“Watch out for yourself next time.” Sirius said to him with a concerned glance. “It’s more than enough that I had to babysit my brother all these years. I’m not starting over with his friends.” He added sassily.

Remus just shook his head and grabbed Sirius arm to pull him out of the dorm.

Evan fell asleep what felt like immediately. But it didn’t last long. He was woken up by Barty shaking him violently and Regulus leaning over his bed like a ghost.

“Wake up you moron. We have to go to breakfast.” Regulus noted.

“Wild time last night, huh?” Barty smiled at him.

“Not as wild as yours.” Evan didn’t know why he sounded angry. He had no reason to be.

Barty shook his shoulders and a shot him a playfully innocent look. “No idea what you’re talking about.”