Every once in a while fate would spell out a bad day. Barty would rise and that feeling in his chest would be tighter, his lungs would put in less effort, being alive took more energy than it should. Overtime he had found ways to manage even the bad days. The lashes of anger would lessen but there was always still that ache deep under his skin, one step away from boiling.
Today was one of those days. He took his deep breaths and he counted all his fingers twice over and still there was an incurable itch under his skin. He was alone in the dorm. It would be so easy, too easy to just.. fuck he didn’t know what he wanted to do. He knew what he thought he wanted but it wasn’t true. He just wanted the feeling to go away. Why couldn’t it ever go away?
When Barty was 13 he had been diagnosed with BPD. He hadn’t known exactly what it meant at first and when he started doing research he had realised just how much it had been impacting him. He started looking for ways to cope, ways to live as normally as possible. It took time but eventually he accepted it and looked towards becoming a person he wasn’t ashamed of. It had been rough, he had been through a lot of mental changes in that time but he had persevered. Finally his lungs started to relax and he tried to ignore the urges involving the old blades in the back of his sock drawer. For Barty, being better didn’t quite mean that he didn’t sometimes miss the feeling of an empty stomach and that he didn’t look longingly when he saw the burning end of a cigarette.
The run of the shower stopped and five minutes later Evan stepped out. He wasn't yet in his robes, just the boxers and t-shirt he had slept in. The same shirt he had stolen from Barty the year prior and denied knowing the location too. Barty had to admit it looked good on him. His eyes looked up from Evan's body, which he was now embarrassed to have been looking at for so long, to find his face. His hair was still wet and falling over his eyes, he was unconsciously chewing on his lip. Barty had come to know this as his 'thinking face'.
Barty knew he was staring, he didn't care anymore. Evan was either far too oblivious to notice the crush, or he knew and was just trying to seem nicer. Either way Barty would just have to get over it, which was.. easier said than done. Four years into his feelings for Evan he thought they would never disappear, and honestly he was okay with that. Liking Evan had become his one constant. He made an accomplishment? Evan would praise him. He was having a shitty day?
Evan would support him. He was one tick away from jumping off the astronomy tower? Well okay, maybe some things are better left unsaid.
He wasn’t quite at that point yet. He told himself he wouldn’t get there. “Whatcha thinking about Ev?”
“Nothing that concerns you Barty.” Okay, well he takes back his previous statement. Was it unhealthy how much Barty’s mood relies on Evan? One change of tone can send him spiralling, one kind word gives him a euphoric headache. Evan was the sugar rot in his back molars. So he choked back his teeth and held his tongue when he wanted to scream.
“Yeah, okay, that’s fine Evan. I’m going to class.” Barty did not go to class. It was way too early anyways. He instead stumbled around the halls looking to find the purpose that would otherwise be hidden in the bottom of a bottle of fire whiskey or the end of a blunt. Sobriety made his ears ring with dysphoric bluntness. He didn’t want to live in a world where everything felt this real. But he did want to live, he just had to keep telling himself that.
Every once in a while Barty would ask himself if happy people had to convince themselves they wanted to live. Was it possible for someone to wake up and not lay in bed for half an hour before being able to move? He couldn’t remember a time when he had been happy to be awake.
During his mindlessness, or more so directionlessness as he found himself quite stuck in his mind, Barty ran into the one and only James Potter. James Potter the boy who had never known a bad day. James Potter who smiled at everyone and everything no matter how miserable they were. Barty despised him. Of course he had the obvious reasons, James had stolen Sirius from Regulus. Who had been there when Regulus was at his worst? Sure not his own fucking brother. No, Barty had been the one to wipe his tears and pick him up off the floor. Barty had been there to wrap the scars left by both his mother and Regulus’s own hands, not Sirius. Barty hated James because he had taken away something that Regulus had needed. But he hated him for more than that, reasons he found it hard to admit.
When he had first met James the boy had had a look in his eye that Barty recognized all too well. It was the look he saw in his own reflection on the late nights when the shadows in the corner of his room looked all too like his father’s lumbering silhouette, hands built to hurt. But James was.. well he was James. There was no way that he knew even a speck of the hurt that Barty did. He had taken that look as mocking. Because how could James truly be that hurt and act so happy? How could he fit in so well when Barty was left perpetually drowning in the background? One more tick, one more push and he was blowing up.
He didn’t even mean to yell. He knew he would feel bad after but in the moment it was either he yelled at James or hit the walls hard enough that his fists would break from his own violence. “Look at you, fucking sunshine boy. Did your friends finally kick you out of the dorm?” He put on a voice of thick, fake pity. “Did they finally realise just how pathetic you really are.” Barty was talking to himself, the more he said the more James turned into just another reflection of himself. The scariest part was usually when the person he was yelling at turned back into themselves and he saw who he had hurt. This time was different. Even when James started to look like himself again he still had those eyes that carried more hurt than a normal person should.
Barty realised in that moment, that maybe James wasn’t the person everyone thought he was. Maybe James was a lot more like himself than he thought. So he turned and left, scratching at the skin under his robes to reassure himself he was still breathing.
Barty continued the day with the overwhelming urge to do something drastic. Whether it be cutting off all his friends, or jumping off the astronomy tower. No, why the fuck did that thought keep coming back? He really had to stop doing that. Anyways he wanted something big to change, he felt motionless. He felt like he was frozen in place and suddenly had absolutely no control. No matter how hard and how far he reached for the reins everything was spiralling in a mess of orbits and he was afraid he was going to lose himself somewhere in the chaos.
When the sun fell it became too much. Night time was always the worst. Everyone's mumbles died down and he was left with nothing but the ringing in his ears and the faint hunger pangs in his stomach. He couldn’t eat on the harder days, nausea was the nurse holding his throat forever captive. When he closed his eyes he would think of unrequited love, of licking the whiskey from the backs of Evan’s teeth, of the slap of Evans hands. He imagined how his rings would cut into his cheek and he would appreciate it. He would do anything, endure any abuse. After all, what was love without pain? His parents had taught him that if someone really loved you, you would be able to tell by the ache of your skin from the bruises they left.
He left his bed, being sure to be extra quiet. He packed only the essentials, the bottle of fire whiskey he kept under his bed, a pack of Marlboro's he had stolen from his dad’s stash, the letters he thought he would never have to send. You know, the essentials. He made his way to the astronomy tower, secretly thinking he was a genius. No one would be there, no one would know until morning. At the same time he felt an ounce of grief in his chest, but he couldn’t turn back now. On several occasions he had found himself alone in front of this door, ready to jump off. Every time he had turned around and gone to bed, waking up in the morning like nothing happened. This time would be different, he swore it.
He stepped through the door and swallowed his breath, but when he opened his eyes he found he wasn’t alone. And who would he find sitting by the edge, looking out at the view? None other than James Potter. Barty could sense the tenseness in him, how could he not when he felt it so clearly in himself as well. So he decided to make his presence known.
“Rough night?” He decided to be nice, he held back his teeth and let out the softness he craved to hear back. If he shut his eyes tight enough then he could imagine that it was his own father. He blinked off the cruel false reality as James’ focus turned onto Barty.
“Why are you here?”
Barty knew why, he knew exactly why. He took his time before answering. He moved towards James and took his hand, pulling him back and sitting down against the wall. There was nothing awkward about the touch. It was like old friends, kindred spirits. Weirdly intimate in a way, as if Barty was looking at the other side of himself, the half he had buried so far down that he didn’t even think could still breathe. “Same reason as you are, sunshine boy.” The once cruel name tasted raw and sympathetic between his lips.
James just shook his head, laughing through a cracking voice. “No. No you aren’t Barty. You have no clue why I’m here.”
“You were going to jump. You probably have the letters in your bag over there. You probably said good night to everyone and told them you loved them before they went to bed because you knew you wouldn’t be able to do it ever again. You came here and didn’t expect to walk back. So did I. Thanks for ruining my plans Potter.”
“Oh.” There was a moment of stiff silence. “Thank you too I guess.”
Barty pulled the bottle out of his bag. If he wasn’t going to kill himself he may as well get so wasted that he felt dead in the morning. “You want some.”
James recoiled for a second. “No. I don’t drink.”
Barty’s curiosity got the better of him. “Oh? Any reason for that? I mean I get quidditch and all but you do seem like the ‘party every weekend’ sort of guy.”
James huffed before speaking in a voice so small it might never have existed. It dawned on Barty just how frail James looked in this moment. How could someone who shone so bright to the rest of the world be burning out this quickly? He knew, he knew all too well, James didn’t want to exist at all. “My dads a drinker. It’s less appealing when you associate with that yknow?”
“He ever hit ya?” God, they were too alike.
“Yeah, if I upset him.”
“Mine too.” Barty hadn’t told anyone that before. “Mine drinks as well, I just do it cause it pisses him off.”
James look confused, but slowly the tension in his shoulders was disappearing. “You want him to be mad at you?”
“I want him to despise me. I have no respect for him. One day I think I’ll kill him.”
James didn’t answer for a while. Barty took it as an opportunity to offer something else. “You smoke?” James nodded and Barty passed him one of the cigarettes. The two sat together in silence for a while, not quite sure what to make of themselves.
“What are we meant to do now?” James broke the silence, the glimmers of weakness returning to his voice, voracious in their strength. “Do we just go back to our dorms like it never happened? What the fuck am I meant to do..” The last line was more of a statement than a question.
Truth was Barty didn’t know the answer. “Never made it this far. I say we either kill ourselves or kill our dads, but my ideas may not be that sane right now.”
Somehow that drew a small laugh from James. Barty hummed alongside him. However much he hated to admit it, he sympathised with James. No one had understood him quite like the boy. And then James said something that made Barty’s breath catch.
“I’m gay.”
Wow okay. So they really were the same person. “Yeah? Which bloke made you realise that?”
James looked dumbfounded. “You’re not gonna leave or call me gross? You don’t think I’m a sin?”
“Mine was Evan, 4 years ago. Still in love with him, I think I always will be.”
James looked down. “Regulus. I can’t even remember how long ago it was.”
Barty laughed softly. “Oh you would like him wouldn’t you? Good luck with that, spawn of Satan that boy is.” He paused for a second. “Nice looking though. I hope it worked out for you James. I really do.”
Maybe in one reality Barty had been just five minutes slower and James had died. Maybe in another reality Barty had jumped. But in this one he hadn’t. In this one he had survived one more day. Now he found himself returning to the tower once a week, luckily with a somewhat better mood, just to talk to James. It was a comfort Barty had never before allowed himself to have.
Some years after graduating Barty got a letter in the mail. That’s how he learned James Potter had died.
Hi Barty,
I don't know how to word this, I've never been much of a writer. Do you remember that first time in the astronomy tower? I can still picture every sec
Every once in a while fate would spell out a bad day. Barty would rise and that feeling in his chest would be tighter, his lungs would put in less effort, being alive took more energy than it should. Overtime he had found ways to manage even the bad days. The lashes of anger would lessen but there was always still that ache deep under his skin, one step away from boiling.
Today was one of those days. He took his deep breaths and he counted all his fingers twice over and still there was an incurable itch under his skin. He was alone in the dorm. It would be so easy, too easy to just.. fuck he didn’t know what he wanted to do. He knew what he thought he wanted but it wasn’t true. He just wanted the feeling to go away. Why couldn’t it ever go away?
When Barty was 13 he had been diagnosed with BPD. He hadn’t known exactly what it meant at first and when he started doing research he had realised just how much it had been impacting him. He started looking for ways to cope, ways to live as normally as possible. It took time but eventually he accepted it and looked towards becoming a person he wasn’t ashamed of. It had been rough, he had been through a lot of mental changes in that time but he had persevered. Finally his lungs started to relax and he tried to ignore the urges involving the old blades in the back of his sock drawer. For Barty, being better didn’t quite mean that he didn’t sometimes miss the feeling of an empty stomach and that he didn’t look longingly when he saw the burning end of a cigarette.
The run of the shower stopped and five minutes later Evan stepped out. He wasn't yet in his robes, just the boxers and t-shirt he had slept in. The same shirt he had stolen from Barty the year prior and denied knowing the location too. Barty had to admit it looked good on him. His eyes looked up from Evan's body, which he was now embarrassed to have been looking at for so long, to find his face. His hair was still wet and falling over his eyes, he was unconsciously chewing on his lip. Barty had come to know this as his 'thinking face'.
Barty knew he was staring, he didn't care anymore. Evan was either far too oblivious to notice the crush, or he knew and was just trying to seem nicer. Either way Barty would just have to get over it, which was.. easier said than done. Four years into his feelings for Evan he thought they would never disappear, and honestly he was okay with that. Liking Evan had become his one constant. He made an accomplishment? Evan would praise him. He was having a shitty day?
Evan would support him. He was one tick away from jumping off the astronomy tower? Well okay, maybe some things are better left unsaid.
He wasn’t quite at that point yet. He told himself he wouldn’t get there. “Whatcha thinking about Ev?”
“Nothing that concerns you Barty.” Okay, well he takes back his previous statement. Was it unhealthy how much Barty’s mood relies on Evan? One change of tone can send him spiralling, one kind word gives him a euphoric headache. Evan was the sugar rot in his back molars. So he choked back his teeth and held his tongue when he wanted to scream.
“Yeah, okay, that’s fine Evan. I’m going to class.” Barty did not go to class. It was way too early anyways. He instead stumbled around the halls looking to find the purpose that would otherwise be hidden in the bottom of a bottle of fire whiskey or the end of a blunt. Sobriety made his ears ring with dysphoric bluntness. He didn’t want to live in a world where everything felt this real. But he did want to live, he just had to keep telling himself that.
Every once in a while Barty would ask himself if happy people had to convince themselves they wanted to live. Was it possible for someone to wake up and not lay in bed for half an hour before being able to move? He couldn’t remember a time when he had been happy to be awake.
During his mindlessness, or more so directionlessness as he found himself quite stuck in his mind, Barty ran into the one and only James Potter. James Potter the boy who had never known a bad day. James Potter who smiled at everyone and everything no matter how miserable they were. Barty despised him. Of course he had the obvious reasons, James had stolen Sirius from Regulus. Who had been there when Regulus was at his worst? Sure not his own fucking brother. No, Barty had been the one to wipe his tears and pick him up off the floor. Barty had been there to wrap the scars left by both his mother and Regulus’s own hands, not Sirius. Barty hated James because he had taken away something that Regulus had needed. But he hated him for more than that, reasons he found it hard to admit.
When he had first met James the boy had had a look in his eye that Barty recognized all too well. It was the look he saw in his own reflection on the late nights when the shadows in the corner of his room looked all too like his father’s lumbering silhouette, hands built to hurt. But James was.. well he was James. There was no way that he knew even a speck of the hurt that Barty did. He had taken that look as mocking. Because how could James truly be that hurt and act so happy? How could he fit in so well when Barty was left perpetually drowning in the background? One more tick, one more push and he was blowing up.
He didn’t even mean to yell. He knew he would feel bad after but in the moment it was either he yelled at James or hit the walls hard enough that his fists would break from his own violence. “Look at you, fucking sunshine boy. Did your friends finally kick you out of the dorm?” He put on a voice of thick, fake pity. “Did they finally realise just how pathetic you really are.” Barty was talking to himself, the more he said the more James turned into just another reflection of himself. The scariest part was usually when the person he was yelling at turned back into themselves and he saw who he had hurt. This time was different. Even when James started to look like himself again he still had those eyes that carried more hurt than a normal person should.
Barty realised in that moment, that maybe James wasn’t the person everyone thought he was. Maybe James was a lot more like himself than he thought. So he turned and left, scratching at the skin under his robes to reassure himself he was still breathing.
Barty continued the day with the overwhelming urge to do something drastic. Whether it be cutting off all his friends, or jumping off the astronomy tower. No, why the fuck did that thought keep coming back? He really had to stop doing that. Anyways he wanted something big to change, he felt motionless. He felt like he was frozen in place and suddenly had absolutely no control. No matter how hard and how far he reached for the reins everything was spiralling in a mess of orbits and he was afraid he was going to lose himself somewhere in the chaos.
When the sun fell it became too much. Night time was always the worst. Everyone's mumbles died down and he was left with nothing but the ringing in his ears and the faint hunger pangs in his stomach. He couldn’t eat on the harder days, nausea was the nurse holding his throat forever captive. When he closed his eyes he would think of unrequited love, of licking the whiskey from the backs of Evan’s teeth, of the slap of Evans hands. He imagined how his rings would cut into his cheek and he would appreciate it. He would do anything, endure any abuse. After all, what was love without pain? His parents had taught him that if someone really loved you, you would be able to tell by the ache of your skin from the bruises they left.
He left his bed, being sure to be extra quiet. He packed only the essentials, the bottle of fire whiskey he kept under his bed, a pack of Marlboro's he had stolen from his dad’s stash, the letters he thought he would never have to send. You know, the essentials. He made his way to the astronomy tower, secretly thinking he was a genius. No one would be there, no one would know until morning. At the same time he felt an ounce of grief in his chest, but he couldn’t turn back now. On several occasions he had found himself alone in front of this door, ready to jump off. Every time he had turned around and gone to bed, waking up in the morning like nothing happened. This time would be different, he swore it.
He stepped through the door and swallowed his breath, but when he opened his eyes he found he wasn’t alone. And who would he find sitting by the edge, looking out at the view? None other than James Potter. Barty could sense the tenseness in him, how could he not when he felt it so clearly in himself as well. So he decided to make his presence known.
“Rough night?” He decided to be nice, he held back his teeth and let out the softness he craved to hear back. If he shut his eyes tight enough then he could imagine that it was his own father. He blinked off the cruel false reality as James’ focus turned onto Barty.
“Why are you here?”
Barty knew why, he knew exactly why. He took his time before answering. He moved towards James and took his hand, pulling him back and sitting down against the wall. There was nothing awkward about the touch. It was like old friends, kindred spirits. Weirdly intimate in a way, as if Barty was looking at the other side of himself, the half he had buried so far down that he didn’t even think could still breathe. “Same reason as you are, sunshine boy.” The once cruel name tasted raw and sympathetic between his lips.
James just shook his head, laughing through a cracking voice. “No. No you aren’t Barty. You have no clue why I’m here.”
“You were going to jump. You probably have the letters in your bag over there. You probably said good night to everyone and told them you loved them before they went to bed because you knew you wouldn’t be able to do it ever again. You came here and didn’t expect to walk back. So did I. Thanks for ruining my plans Potter.”
“Oh.” There was a moment of stiff silence. “Thank you too I guess.”
Barty pulled the bottle out of his bag. If he wasn’t going to kill himself he may as well get so wasted that he felt dead in the morning. “You want some.”
James recoiled for a second. “No. I don’t drink.”
Barty’s curiosity got the better of him. “Oh? Any reason for that? I mean I get quidditch and all but you do seem like the ‘party every weekend’ sort of guy.”
James huffed before speaking in a voice so small it might never have existed. It dawned on Barty just how frail James looked in this moment. How could someone who shone so bright to the rest of the world be burning out this quickly? He knew, he knew all too well, James didn’t want to exist at all. “My dads a drinker. It’s less appealing when you associate with that yknow?”
“He ever hit ya?” God, they were too alike.
“Yeah, if I upset him.”
“Mine too.” Barty hadn’t told anyone that before. “Mine drinks aswell, I just do it cause it pisses him off.”
James look confused, but slowly the tension in his shoulders was disappearing. “You want him to be mad at you?”
“I want him to despise me. I have no respect for him. One day I think I’ll kill him.”
James didn’t answer for a while. Barty took it as an opportunity to offer something else. “You smoke?” James nodded and Barty passed him one of the cigarettes. The two sat together in silence for a while, not quite sure what to make of themselves.
“What are we meant to do now?” James broke the silence, the glimmers of weakness returning to his voice, voracious in their strength. “Do we just go back to our dorms like it never happened? What the fuck am I meant to do..” The last line was more of a statement than a question.
Truth was Barty didn’t know the answer. “Never made it this far. I say we either kill ourselves or kill our dads, but my ideas may not be that sane right now.”
Somehow that drew a small laugh from James. Barty hummed alongside him. However much he hated to admit it, he sympathised with James. No one had understood him quite like the boy. And then James said something that made Barty’s breath catch.
“I’m gay.”
Wow okay. So they really were the same person. “Yeah? Which bloke made you realise that?”
James looked dumbfounded. “You’re not gonna leave or call me gross? You don’t think I’m a sin?”
“Mine was Evan, 4 years ago. Still in love with him, I think I always will be.”
James looked down. “Regulus. I can’t even remember how long ago it was.”
Barty laughed softly. “Oh you would like him wouldn’t you? Good luck with that, spawn of Satan that boy is.” He paused for a second. “Nice looking though. I hope it worked out for you James. I really do.”
Maybe in one reality Barty had been just five minutes slower and James had died. Maybe in another reality Barty had jumped. But in this one he hadn’t. In this one he had survived one more day. Now he found himself returning to the tower once a week, luckily with a somewhat better mood, just to talk to James. It was a comfort Barty had never before allowed himself to have.
Some years after graduating Barty got a letter in the mail. That’s how he learned James Potter had died.
Hi Barty,
I’m not sure how to word this. I was never much of a writer. Some part of me hopes this will never need to be sent. Some part of me knows it will. Do you remember the first night together in the astronomy tower? I feel like every second of that night was underlined in the timeline that is my life. Does that sound weird? I still remember your hand on mine. I still think of it on nights when everything feels too dark.
You made me feel seen, Barty. I didn’t know how to say it to your face but I kept lists of things that made me think of you. I don’t know if I had a crush on you but you must have known there was something between us, even before that kiss. I’ve tried countless times to hold my tongue and tell myself otherwise but I think, correction I know, that I was in love with you. I was in love with you the way a heart loves a defibrillator (Wow maybe I can write). I love you because you kept me alive when I was dying but sometimes I wish I could have died. I know you probably hate to hear that but I wouldn’t lie to you.
Ok let’s just say this. I love you Barty. I love you because you were the one loveable part of myself. I love you and I wish I didn’t and I could never tell you because I know it’s wrong. It’s not wrong for you but it's wrong for me. I can’t do that to my mum. That’s why I had to die.
Maybe in another universe we can be more than late night secrets.
Yours,
Sunshine boy