Do you really hate me?
Over the remainder of the autumn holidays, James had been helping Regulus settle in, or at least he’d been trying.
His mother told him he shouldn’t overwhelm Regulus by constantly trying to hang out with him and Sirius, but instead let him find his place in this new home. And Sirius told James rather often to leave Regulus and him so they could forge that brotherly bond again. And apparently Sirius also knew that James wouldn’t necessarily be liked by his younger brother, and even told James that much. At the start he tried to hold onto Sirius’ rule, but the longer Regulus stayed, the longer James took notice of the things that made him interesting. The less time Sirius would spend with him, the more he would envy all the time the two brothers spent together.
He would watch them and wonder why Sirius thought Regulus wouldn’t like him. He had been nice to him throughout all of school and James even came to enjoy his presence in his home.
He would sit in Montys sofa chair and read classics while reading tea in the evening, and James would watch him from his kitchen.
He would be sketching under a tree in the mornings, and James would sit on the sofa and watch him out of the window.
But James wasn’t stalking him exactly: he was admiring him.
He just hadn’t talked to him that much, other than during meal times or small talk when passing him in the halls. Yet he wanted to so so much. He always had so much to say, but listening to Regulus talk to Sirius or his parents, he felt that with him he probably wouldn’t have to.
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James had been laying in his bed for hours at this point and wasn’t going to fall asleep soon, so he got up and wandered into the kitchen. He had taken his medication too late in the day and now his thoughts just wouldn’t shut up. He entered the kitchen and walked over to the kettle to put some water on.
“Oh”, he muttered as he saw a figure drinking their tea at the table in the dark, “Hey, Regulus.”
“Potter”
Right. He never understood why Regulus referred to him by his last name. it felt so stupidly formal. Although James did know that Regulus only called his closest friends by their first name, and Sirius, and his parents. He had also seen peter and Remus a few times, as well as Marlene who he referred to by their given names. Ok so maybe he only called James by his last name, but so what? That didn’t necessarily mean that he genuinely didn’t like James.
“Hello?”, Regulus asked into the darkness.
“Right sorry, I got a little bit carried away. Why aren’t you in bed?”
“I have a hard time sleeping: Insomnia you know, usually things like melatonin help, but I haven’t got any here, since I didn’t exactly get to pack my bags before leaving.”
James chuckled a bit before turning serious again: “That really sucks, I’m sorry.”
“Its fine, why are you up so late though? Don’t you usually wake up scarily early?”. Honestly James had to smile a little internally at that. Regulus noticed something about him! Ok, maybe his sleeping habits weren’t exactly too much of a secret but it was still something, right?
“Yeahh, I couldn’t sleep, you know medications and stuff. Do you have any tips? I mean I probably would have just stayed up until the morning at his point, haha.”
“I mean I always image a scenario from a book I’m reading and that makes me fall asleep fairly easily, that might just be the melatonin though.”
“Well thank you, I’m going to go and try that, maybe I’ll still get a few hours of sleep in”
“Sure, if it helps.”
James had just started exiting the kitchen when he remembered and turned back around: “Listen Reg? Do you really hate me, and if you do that’s fine-, but why? Did I- I don’t know- did I do something?
“Uhm no? I mean I didn’t love your relationship with my brother while I was living at home and surely that had an impact on my opinion of you. I don’t exactly like everything about you, but I definitely don’t hate you.”
“Oh ok, it’s just Pads said that-“
“What? What did he tell you?”, Regulus interrupted. He seemed to be getting more nervous by the second which told James all he needed to know. He had to go back upstairs and stop questioning Regulus.
“Its fine, I mean it’s probably true anyway. He just said I should let you guys spend time together without always being there, since you wouldn’t like me and it would probably benefit your relationship.”
“James is that why you’ve been avoiding the living room when Sirius and me hang out in the mornings? You can still spend time with us, it’s not that big of a deal. It’s still your house you know?”
“I just don’t want to get in the way of your brotherhood, you haven’t lived in the same house for quite some time now and it’s important to reconnect.”
“Potter, I know that, but you don’t have to steer clear of us at all times.
“I guess you’re right. I’ll come read with you guys in the living room tomorrow morning alright?”
“If you will be silent. We won’t have a problem.”
“Yeah, good night Reg.”, James said as he turned and went up the stairs to his room, never hearing a reply back from Regulus.
Tomorrow he would spend a little bit of time with them, even if he had to talk to Sirius about it.