bad idea, right?

Despite what Pandora, Professor Slughorn, Dorcas, Madame Pomfrey, and Regulus all had to say about it, Benjy Fenwick had asked for it.

It had all started on Sunday, when Slytherin was set to play Ravenclaw in Quidditch. 

After his talk with Evan the day before, Barty was feeling a lot better. Though one may be surprised, considering the frequency with which it occurred, Barty hated fighting with Evan. Don’t get him wrong, Barty loved “fighting” with Evan – verbal sparring, petty debates, passive aggressive quips – but he hated actually fighting with Evan, when Evan closed himself off and went silent or Barty, though he wasn’t proud of it, ran from the things that scared him. And in all honesty, the reason they had been fighting was entirely Barty’s fault. He had freaked out after Evan had given him that love bite. Which was stupid, because, first off, it was Evan, and obviously it didn’t mean anything, and second, because Barty, despite being straight, had kissed boys before, and it had never been a big deal. Merlin, he’d kissed Reggie more times than he could count during Spin the Bottle, and he vaguely remembers kissing James Potter once during a drinking game, though he’d take that one to his grave, as Regulus would probably send him there immediately if he found out.

All this is to say that Evan sucking on his neck, however skillfully, did not affect Barty at all. If anything, he had been avoiding Evan because he didn’t want Evan to be uncomfortable. And the minute he realized Evan wasn’t, he had gone back to being normal. Yes, for the first week after, he had dodged Evan’s touch, feeling an odd burning sensation whenever they had skin-on-skin contact, but that was inevitable after you had a sexual encounter with someone. At least he assumed. He didn’t normally interact with his sexual partners outside of, well, the actual sex.

Regardless, Barty was completely unbothered, and all was well and good, and Barty couldn’t say that he wasn’t a little bit pleased that Evan had ended things with that absolute bore Fenwick. The bloke probably gets off on standing in front of a mirror and smiling. He probably uses one of his fucking Frog Choir seranades (yes, one of Hogwarts’ most eligible bachelors is in Frog Choir, which is just another reason to hate him) as foreplay. He and Evan probably had boring, vanilla sex, while Evan lied there dead bored. Because there is no way that Evan enjoyed Benjy Fenwick. Granted, Barty wasn’t quite sure what Evan enjoyed, but he imagined it would be someone who was more of a challenge, someone who could release the wild nature he so unassumingly hid, someone who not only allowed him, but reveled in, his crazy.

But whatever. Good riddance, Benjy Fenwick.

Barty tightened his Quidditch robes, glancing over at Regulus, who was fidgeting with a snitch. Not the game snitch, obviously, but one that he kept in the dorm. It was a good luck charm, essentially, but Regulus Black was above matters as trivial as good luck charms, so he called it a “grounding object” instead. Bloody posh bastard. 

It was only him, Evan, and Reggie in the Slytherin changing room. The rest of the team had begun to warm-up, but they always chose to stay in the room a little longer. Barty did it for Regulus, mostly. Despite the big game he talked, Reggie still hated crowds as much as he did as a tiny second-year, and those few moments before he got immersed in the Quidditch game were nausea-inducing for him. So they lingered back so that Regulus could wait out facing the crowd until the very last minute. 

“You aren’t going to fuck up that new play, right?”

Barty rolled his eyes. “Yes, Regulus, I’ve made it my mission for today to purposely mess up the game.”

Looking back, perhaps Barty jinxed it.

The game started as usual. The snitch was released, Reggie took off into the air at the speed of light, while Barty grasped his bat tightly and set off in search of bludgers to hurdle towards the Ravenclaws. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Evan, whipping around the pitch with his brook, quaffle in hand. Barty loved watching Evan play Quidditch. Unlike Barty, who flew aggressively, Evan flew with a sort of dangerous grace in his movements. He wasn’t necessarily the fastest flier on the pitch, though he was really fucking fast, but he was agile and absurdly smart, and Barty watched as he darted between the Ravenclaw chasers without them even realizing it. On his other side, Barty saw Benjy Fenwick, who was conveniently one of the Ravenclaw beaters, inching towards him, bat in hand, eyeing the bludger that whizzed by Barty. Noticing it as well, Barty set his broom in that direction, flying away from Benjy.

Clearly unable to take the hint, Benjy sidled up next to him on his broom, pushing Barty off his course towards the bludger. Speeding up a bit, he reached it just before Barty, hitting it towards Dorcas, who was further towards the Slytherin goal hoop. Benjy turned around and smirked at Barty, arching a brow.

“Too slow, Crouch?”

Barty just couldn’t help himself.

“Don’t look so smug, Fenwick. I heard Evan dumped your sorry arse. Thank god he finally came to his senses.”

Benjy darkened at that. “Do you get off on that, Crouch? Purposefully ruining your friend’s chances at happiness. Are you so selfish that you need Evan all to yourself?”

Yes, he wanted to respond. But instead, he said, “Ruined? From what I heard, it seems like you did that all yourself. And good riddance, considering Evan is kilometers out of your league.”

He hadn’t even realized how true that was until he said it. Sure, Benjy was…passably attractive. But he couldn’t hold a candle to Evan. It wasn’t even because Evan was attractive, though that was incredibly obvious, but Evan was one of the best people he knew. No, he may have been the best person Barty knew. Sure, he was stubborn, and competitive, and easily irritable, and completely insane at times, and he had a mean streak when he wanted to, but Evan was also honest, and decent, and so incredibly funny, and possibly the smartest person Barty knew. And, as any idiot could see right now, a complete force to be reckoned with on the Quidditch pitch. At this point, it wasn’t even Benjy. Nobody was good enough for Evan.

“And I suppose you are?”

“Hm?” Barty asked blankly, his mind far away.

“I suppose you are? In Evan’s league, I mean?”

Barty snorted. “Can’t be more out of it than you are.”

“You don’t deserve him, Crouch,” Benjy said, pushing away from Barty to dive for the bludger a few feet below them. Barty came back to the game, noticing that while him and Benjy had been talking, Evan and the other chasers had scored 2 goals.

“Oi, get your head out of your ass, Crouch!” Dorcas yelled. He flipped her off.

“Stop ogling your girlfriend on the pitch, Meadowes!” he called back. She flushed (or he imagined she did, since she was too far away for him to tell), and dodged a bludger from the other Ravenclaw beater.

Barty leaned to the side suddenly, narrowly missing a bludger aimed at him by Benjy. What was it he had said? That Barty didn’t deserve Evan. Well no shit, Barty thought. It didn't take a mind reader to know that Evan was a better person than Barty was, in pretty much every aspect of his life. And he definitely didn’t need Benjy to tell him that. 

As if he manifested himself, Benjy buzzed by his ear. Barty scowled at his retreating form. How dare he act as if he deserved Evan more than Barty did? Barty was the one who had snuck Evan into his room every time he had run away from home. Barty was the one who had held Evan while he’d cried when his mother had died. Where the fuck was Benjy back then? Why did he get to act like he cared when he had only noticed Evan after his haircut, as if Evan hadn’t been heart-wrenchingly beautiful his entire life.

Barty forgot all about the Quidditch game. He forgot about the bludger, forgot about Evan’s flying and Reggie hunting down the snitch, and turned out the protests of Dorcas in the background. Instead, he grabbed his broom and shot towards where Benjy hovered on the other side of the pitch, ignoring the shouts around him. 

“What the fuck did you mean by that, Fenwick?” he demanded, cutting off Benjy’s path.

Benjy had the audacity to smile, as if pleased by Barty’s crisis.

“You mean when I said that Evan doesn’t deserve you?”

“Who the fuck ever told you that you deserved Evan, Fenwick? You don’t know a thing about Evan.”

“And you do?” Benjy challenged. Barty wanted to throttle him.

“I know a hell of a lot more than you do, you fucking moron.”

“You’re gonna destroy him eventually,” Benjy said matter-of-factly. It seemed he had forgotten about the game too.

“What the fuck did you just say to me?” Barty asked, slightly aghast.

“You flirt with him and make him feel special, but you forget that he isn’t like you, Barty. Evan knows how to feel, and he feels so strongly. He’s gay, and flirting with him constantly is only going to confuse him. You can’t claim him but then not give him what he really wants. It’s selfish.” 

It was the longest he had ever heard Benjy Fenwick speak, and possibly the most passionate he had heard him as well.

“You don’t know anything about me and Evan. Stop basing your fucking assumptions on the idea that I will inevitably hurt Evan. I would do a lot of things, Fenwick, but I would never hurt Evan Rosier.”

Benjy smiled, though Barty couldn’t tell if it was rueful or cruel. “Call me a cynic, Crouch. Just know that the day that you inevitably do ruin him, I’ll be waiting to treat him how he deserves.”

And that was Barty’s last straw. He could handle knowing he wasn’t good enough for Evan, even knowing that he might be hurting Evan, no matter how much it destroyed him to hear it. But what he could not handle is the image of Evan collapsing into Benjy Fenwick’s arms instead of his.

Barty shot towards him, gripping Benjy’s broom and tugging it hard. Benjy glanced up at him with wild eyes, grabbing ahold of his broom in turn. They played a game of in-air tug-of-war for a moment, attempting to pull one another from their broom. 

Evan, holding Benjy and stroking his air while singing softly. Evan, watching with wide eyes as Benjy plays the guitar, not Barty. Evan, wrapping his sweaty arms around Benjy after a Quidditch match, rather than trying to rub off his sweat and grime on Barty just to piss him off. Evan, running to Benjy’s room whenever he has a bad dream. Evan, laying in Benjy’s arms while he tries to fall back asleep. Benjy, whispering sweet reassurances to Evan in their shared bed, the bed that should be Barty and Evan’s safe place, where their fourteen years of friendship have remained untouched.

Barty knocked Benjy, hard, the force of a thousand possible memories spurring him to push with every bone in his body. He grabbed hold of Benjy’s broom, yanking down hard and Benjy lost all balance. And with a satisfied smirk on his face, Barty watches as Benjy tumbles from his broom, closer and closer towards the dark brown Earth.

Hey, Barty never said that he wasn’t mental.

It wasn’t like Benjy would die, anyway. There was a magical barrier in place that acted like a trampoline, cushioning any fall about 20 feet above the ground. Benjy would be completely fine, perhaps a broken arm or leg. And though he knew it was wrong, Barty got a sick thrill out of it.

He heard screams all around him as both teams realized Benjy’s fall. He watched the Ravenclaw team dive down to see him, screaming out for help from the professors. He watched as Benjy was carried away, and the announcers declared that the game would be forfeited. And in the midst of watching all this, he didn’t notice Evan coming up behind him.

“You did that,” Evan said, voice hollow.

Barty locked eyes with him, and he knew he couldn’t lie. “Yeah, I did.”

“On purpose.”

“Yes, Evan. On purpose. But you should’ve heard what he was–”

“I don’t give a fuck what he was saying!” Evan exploded. “You attacked him, Barty! Are you completely mental?”

“Well,” Barty started.

“If you make a sarcastic comment right now I will strangle you.”

Barty shut up.

“Why did you do it, Barty?” Evan asked, exasperated.

“He kept saying that I wasn’t good for you, and that I would end up–”

“Hurting me,” Evan finished. 

“Yeah,” he said, glancing up.

Evan didn’t look sad. Or even disappointed. He looked, well, tired. As if being in this conversation, being around Barty, exhausted him.

“You did hurt me, B.” And if Barty wasn’t already hurting enough, the nickname completely obliterated him. The tenderness with which Evan used the letter, it made Barty feel like someone who deserved love, who could be loved.

“I suppose Benjy was right about me then,” Barty said hollowly. He refused to meet Evan’s eyes.

“I suppose he was.” Evan answered, before flying down, presumably to tend to Benjy’s bedside. After all, Benjy didn’t hurt him. Benjy deserved him. And Barty didn’t. He never would. And perhaps he was even more mental than he’d thought, because that realization seemed to hurt more than any curse his father had ever thrown at him.