Take a Hike
The wildflower reserve wasn’t far from where Sirius and Remus lived, and even before lockdown they had gone occasionally to do some light hiking. It was warmer out than Regulus had expected, but he was too afraid of catching poison ivy or being bitten by some obscure insect that would give him a life-threatening disease. No, better to sweat it out in his pants and flannel button up shirt. And the wool socks. And the boots.
He narrowed his eyes slightly at Sirius up ahead, in knee-length walking shorts and a sleeveless white vest top, his wool socks peeking over the top of serious brown hiking boots. Remus wore pants and a t-shirt, but both were walking over the trail as if it required no more effort than breathing. Sirius skipped ahead, practically bloody frolicking. Regulus narrowed his eyes further.
Regulus took this moment to pause, pulling his undershirt from where it was sticking to his sweat-slick skin. He tugged it back and forth off of his chest, allowing some of the light breeze to slide against him and bring some relief to where his shirt had been sticking. He released his grip on the front of the cotton, hearing Sirius’s voice in his head (“Don’t you have anything moisture-wicking? Layers Reg!”). Sports and the great outdoors had never exactly called to Regulus. He’d always been softer, more at home curled up with a book than chasing a football about or lifting weights. He’d kept up with the ballroom dancing that his mother had forced them into—long after Sirius had quit. To Regulus, it was a way to keep somewhat active, to get out of his head for a bit and lose himself in the music.
And why was it so hot? It wasn’t supposed to be this hot yet. It was only May.
The breeze ruffled the leaves overhead, playing with the shadows and dappled sunlight sifting through overhead. It was pretty, and very, very green—as if someone had turned the saturation all the way up in a photograph. With a sigh, he continued onward, picking his way cautiously over the roots and rocks. Regulus had already slid along the path on a rock once, reaching out and grabbing onto Remus’s arm as he sailed past, trying to remain upright. Apart from a bit of mud along the leg of his trousers, he had managed to make it out relatively unscathed. Sirius had laughed so loud it had startled some birds out of a nearby tree.
As he kept relatively in pace with Sirius and Remus, trudging along behind them but never entirely losing sight of them, the trail began to slant upward, and the slight incline became a steep incline that soon removed the others from view. Regulus tried to remain as dignified as possible, but he was gasping for breath, a stitch causing a searing sharpness in his side, which he clutched miserably.
Soon he was scowling, having completely lost Sirius and Remus, unable to even hear Sirius’s vibrant laugh any more. He tried to hurry, stepped on a loose rock, and nearly rolled his ankle, narrowly avoiding going ass-over-tea-kettle down the hilly path only by grabbing onto a spindly tree that he prayed would hold his weight (it did).
He slowed to a walk that was more of a crawl after that, doing his level best to prevent his heel from touching the back of his still-mostly-aesthetic hiking boots. This was quite a feat considering that between the heat and the hike his feet felt as if they had swollen to twice their normal size and were scraping against the backs of the boots (Sirius had warned him to break them in by wearing them about the house, or, at the very least, rubbing them with mink oil. Regulus had declined).
So much for the wool socks, he thought, narrowing his eyes at his own inner monologue.
Eventually the path began to level out, the trodden dirt giving way to lush green. Regulus nearly sobbed with relief at the bench sitting tucked into the foliage, butterflies fluttering in and out of the pinks and purples and yellows of the wildflowers. He threw himself onto the bench, glancing around at the clearing. There was a tiny cabin that could pass as an extravagant shed, and Regulus didn’t have it within himself to be more curious because he was too busy regretting the lack of water. At the time, he didn’t want to carry the bottle the entire hike, but now he wonders what kind of idiot would have decided to hike unfamiliar terrain without ensuring proper hydration.
Oh, that’s right. Him.
He pulled out his phone, hoping to call Sirius and figure out where the bloody hell he and Remus were. Of course, of fucking course, no service.
What if he was lost and had to spend the night in this park?
He supposed he could break into that pitiful cabin and spend the night, though the thought of how many spiders were lurking in there had him shivering delicately in the blazing sun. That wouldn’t do. The thing really should be condemned, he thought, nostrils flaring as he assessed.
Sliding his thumb to open up the phone’s camera feature, he snapped a quick photo of the cabin framed in the shade of the surrounding trees, their boughs nearly meeting across the clearing. The sunlight streamed through, casting the image in butter yellow, and the wildflowers just brushed the edges of the photograph. Regulus lifted one corner of his mouth into a smile, pleased. He would add that to his One Second of the Day later. He’d started doing the app at the beginning of the year, hoping to document little moments of his move and be able to look back in December, seeing how he had grown. Instead, it had been a lot of photos of him in isolation thanks to lockdown—and mostly pictures of Cosmic Creepers.
At that moment, Regulus paused with his phone still lifted, ears perking up like an animal of prey at the sound of something large crashing through the undergrowth. What if it was a bear coming to find him sitting there, putting off pheromones or whatever drew in bears, too weak to move, a tasty hors d’ouevres? He pictured the bear gnawing on his head by the time Sirius and Remus would even notice he was bloody missing, and he would be a lost cause by then.
Instead of a bear, though, or even a wolf, the figure that emerged from the adjacent path was human. Regulus panicked almost as much at that, not having seen many people recently. He yanked up the mask that he had stuffed into his shirt pocket. Never mind that he had nearly suffocated on his hike. The powers that be were still uncertain how, precisely, Covid-19 was spread, or if the outdoors impacted that, and Regulus was not about to take any chances. He had read too many horror stories of perfectly healthy and active twenty-somethings contracting the wretched illness and ending up on a ventilator. As a thirty-something who was not particularly active, that was not a risk he was willing to take.
The figure waved as it approached, and Regulus shielded his eyes from the sun with his hand, assessing. Male, tall, no camouflage or violent orange, so likely not a threat or a hunter. Hopefully he wasn’t one of those serial killer types who lurked in the woods and preyed on unsuspecting victims. Regulus was suspicious, so good luck—he had spent far too many nights recently falling asleep to the ID channel’s constant slew of murder mysteries. And what better time than when everyone is masked and virtually unidentifiable? His heart thudded.
“Hello,” the man said.
He appeared to be about Regulus’s age, or maybe Sirius’s. He smiled before tugging on his own mask, onto which he had (seemingly hand painted) a large, lemon yellow sun. Regulus couldn’t believe anyone would ever wear anything so gauche. His own was black cloth, classic, simple (though he did have the N-95 tucked into car in case he ended up somewhere very crowded—that was the only way he could justify wearing the wretched thing).
“Hello, then,” Regulus said.
“Do you mind if I sit here for a moment?” the man asked, pointing to the open half of the bench upon which Regulus was seated.
Regulus sharply looked at the man, affronted. The man only smiled, eyes crinkling behind gold-rimmed glasses. Regulus nodded once, curtly, not wanting to cause a scene, and then slid himself as far to the edge as he possibly could.
“Thanks,” the man said kindly.
He sat down on the bench, tugging his mask down to gulp water before replacing it. At least he wore it over his nose and mouth, which earned him some points. Regulus was so thirsty at this point that he might even have been willing to share the man’s water, if he offered—well, maybe: he would never be so desperate as to drink after someone else, even if there weren’t a pandemic on.
“Lovely day,” the man said, gesturing around with the top of his water bottle.
“Mmhmm,” Regulus hummed.
“Do you hike here often?” he asked.
“No,” Regulus drawled, “I don’t hike at all.”
The man looked confused, brows knitting.
“That’s why I’m sitting on this bench—these boots are horrendous,” Regulus added, uncertain why he felt compelled to elaborate.
The man glanced down, awareness flickering across the top half of his face. Regulus could practically see the light bulb go off above his head as he took in the barely-creased boots, stiff and unsullied, the laces a vibrant olive green.
“I’d wear liner socks next time,” the man suggested. “And use moleskin, seriously.”
Regulus struggled not to roll his eyes.
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
“I love to come here—there are so many different trails, I try to take a new one each time. I always love this spot though.”
“Is that your cabin then?” Regulus asked sarcastically, jutting his chin in the direction of the horrid little thing.
“Oh I wish,” the man said enthusiastically. “I would love to live somewhere like that, spend time outside, reading or hiking or even kayaking.”
“That sounds like my nightmare,” Regulus said bluntly. “Except the reading bit.”
The man threw his head back and laughed. It was a lovely sound, effervescent and joyous. It made Regulus smile beneath his mask.
“You’re quite funny,” the man remarked.
“Thank you,” Regulus said, and then blurted, “I thought you were a serial killer.”
“You thought I was a serial killer?!” the man exclaimed.
“We are in the middle of the woods.”
“We are at a park designated for people to go hiking,” the man said, his eyes wide.
“Plus you have a horribly painted sunshine on your mask.”
“I thought it would make people smile, since they can’t see anyone’s actual smiles anymore.”
Well. Wasn’t that just tooth-rottingly sweet? Regulus tried his best not to be charmed.
“This is such a weird time, isn’t it?”
“Mid-afternoon?” Regulus asked drolly.
The man laughed again.
“No, this pandemic,” he said. “All of a sudden everyone is baking bread and playing Animal Crossing.”
Regulus immediately pictured Remus, a smirk developing behind his mask.
“And tie dying,” Regulus added, picturing Sirius then.
“Or hiking for the first time in their lives, because closing public places has meant people suddenly discover the outdoors,” the man said, his elbow nudging Regulus’s arm gently.
Regulus narrowed his eyes, but there was laughter dancing in the man’s eyes, and when he took in Regulus’s expression, it bubbled over. Soon, Regulus was laughing too. It was nice, somehow, laughing with a stranger. He had taken for granted how pleasant those exchanges could be sometimes.
“It’s also bloody horrifying,” Regulus admitted once their laughter subsided.
The man nodded, his dark messy hair bobbing where it stuck up at the back of his head.
“It is,” he agreed.
“I don’t know why I do it to myself, but I keep the blasted news on all day, that horrid death toll ticking upwards in the top corner,” Regulus said, looking at his boots.
“Yeah,” the man said softly.
He reached out and touched the back of Regulus’s hand, so gently it could have been the kiss of a butterfly. Regulus’s head snapped up, his eyes widening as they met those of the handsome stranger. The man jerked his hand away as if it had been burned.
“Sorry,” he said quickly. “Just… it will be okay. I just have this feeling.”
“Oh?” Regulus said, trying to maintain his composure while his heart thudded wildly against his ribs.
“Yes,” he said firmly. “And in the meantime, I’ll just keep on, I don’t know, wiping down my cantaloupe with Clorox wipes or whatever else we’re expected to do in ‘these unprecedented times.’”
Regulus’s heart loosened a bit at that—Sirius had laughed at him for wiping down his groceries, but since he couldn’t get a clear answer from anyone, he wasn’t about to take his chances. It made him feel better to know that he wasn’t entirely mad.
He chuckled at the man’s implied air quotes, because wasn’t that the thing? Every advertisement, every sign, every news bulletin used the phrase “these unprecedented times” – everyone got it, no one knew what the fuck was happening, including the experts. And now here Regulus was, sitting on a park bench escaping from a hike of all things, talking to a funny, warm, attractive stranger. Unprecedented indeed.
“Well, I suppose I should get on,” the man said, rising suddenly. “It was nice chatting with you.”
“Er—yes, you as well,” Regulus said stiffly.
“Enjoy the rest of your day!”
The stranger’s eyes crinkled again behind his glasses, and he gave a jaunty little wave before walking down a path behind the bench.
Regulus sat there for a moment, stunned at the sudden silence that seemed so loud after their conversation. The quiet still was broken once again by the sound of trampling undergrowth, snapping twigs, and Regulus’s eyes snapped up to see his brother coming out of the path where the stranger had emerged. Sirius’s arms were up in a “there you are!” gesture, his expression relieved. Remus came up behind him, long legs loping across the distance.
“REGULUS!” Sirius yelled. “Where have you been?”
“Right here,” Regulus crossed his arms and remained seated. He refused to stand up and act as if it were his fault they had left him in the dust.
“You were right behind us,” Remus said.
“I was,” Regulus said. “It would not have killed you to turn around once in a while.”
Sirius plopped down beside him on the bench.
“Sorry, Reg,” he said, pulling his hair off his neck and fanning the back of it with his other hand. “You’ve got to let us know if we’re going too fast, yeah?”
“Well, considering you were practically racing along the path and left me behind from the beginning, you didn’t really give me a chance to tell you much of anything, now did you?” he drawled.
“Okay, you know what—” Sirius began.
Remus’s eyes darted warily between the two of them, and he intervened, diffusing the situation. He had seen the Brothers Black go at it enough times to sense the rising tension.
“Why don’t we head back to the car?” he suggested. “We can grab some water, maybe stop at that farmer’s market on the way back and pick up something to use for dinner tonight?”
The brothers grudgingly agreed and began the hike back to the carpark. Regulus was pleased to see that it was mostly downhill.
*****
Over the next two weekends, Regulus found himself eagerly lacing up his hiking boots, traipsing wildly through the paths that seemed to become overgrown with green foliage overnight. Although he had no idea where he was going or what he was doing, following the trail markers was helpful. He learned which paths he enjoyed (blue and white were pleasant) and which to avoid (yellow) and the ones that he knew were intimidating (red, purple) because they began with paths that went nearly straight up. No, thank you.
He came across the little cabin in the clearing twice more, and tried to ignore the sinking feeling in his stomach when he emerged from the path and saw that the wooden bench was empty. Though he would never admit it to anyone—and struggled to admit it, even to himself—Regulus’s sudden interest in hiking had less to do with the way the idyllic scenery quieted his anxious mind and more to do with the handsome stranger he was hoping to see while he was there.