bad idea, right?

Though they had ended on less-than-ideal terms, Evan felt like he had to go visit Benjy in the hospital wing. Mostly because it was partially his fault that Benjy was in the wing to begin with. Actually, that wasn’t fair. The reason that Benjy was in the hospital wing was 95% the fault of Barty, but Evan supposed he could take 5% of the blame for not realizing Barty’s intentions sooner. After all, Barty had never liked Benjy to begin with, and after learning that Benjy spoke poorly of Barty to Evan, Evan should have known Barty wouldn’t be able to simply let go of the grudge. Barty had an extensive vocabulary, but he was pretty sure it didn’t include the words forgive and forget.

He approached Benjy’s bedside quietly, a bad of Fizzing Whizzbees grasped in his hand. They were Benjy’s favorite, and a peace offering of sorts. Benjy opened one eye slightly, peeking up at Evan.

“Hello there, Evan,” he spoke cautiously. Evan supposed he couldn’t blame him, since Evan’s idiotic best friend was the one who pitched him down 75 feet in the air.

“Hi, Benjy. You feeling alright?” He placed the bag of candy on the bedside table quickly, backing up as you would after offering a treat to a rabid dog. 

Benjy smiled, though it seemed like it hurt to do so. 

“Just peachy. Had to grow back the bones in my arm last night, but I’m all stitched up now.”

Evan smiled in spite of himself. “You look like death, Fenwick.”

“You flatter me too much, Evan. Remind me why I broke up with you again?” Benjy spoke the words solemnly, but the smirk playing on his lips let Evan know he was only teasing.

“I seem to remember breaking up with you,” Evan replied.

Benjy smiled, a little ruefully. “Yeah, I remember that as well.”

The conversation fell silent for a moment, and Evan fidgeted awkwardly with the rings on his fingers.

“Benjy?”

“Yes?” Benjy replied, looking up at him. He really did have beautiful eyes. Evan preferred brown eyes himself, but he couldn’t not appreciate Benjy’s light ones.

“Why didn’t you report Barty as the one who knocked you off your broom? You could’ve gotten him suspended from the team for that.”

This had been nagging at Evan since the incident. A purposefully aggressive maneuver like the one Barty pulled was enough to get a player suspended, or even expelled, from the Quidditch team. Yet Evan had heard that when Madam Pomfrey had asked Benjy about his fall, he had simply shook his head and said something about the inevitable dangers of Quidditch.

“Would it have done anything if I had? I doubt a couple weeks suspension will solve Barty’s anger issues.”

“Maybe not,” Evan said, “but it might have made you feel better.”

Benjy chuckled. “Yeah, it probably would have. But I figured that watching you torment Barty would be enough entertainment for me.”

Evan raised a brow at him. “Tormenting? I thought Barty had brainwashed me.”

Benjy turned serious for a moment. “Maybe so. But you still know right from wrong, Rosier. You aren’t the big scary guy you want people to think you are.”

“Really? Perhaps I’m losing my touch.”

Benjy laughed, though it was a little strained. “Don’t worry, Evan. I still wouldn’t want to be on the receiving end of your wrath. I don’t envy Barty.”

Evan paused for a beat before meeting Benjy’s eyes. 

“I really am sorry, Benjy. About Barty, I mean.”

Benjy stared right back. “I know you are, Evan. That’s the problem. You shouldn’t have to deal with someone who implicates you in their own issues.”

“It’s not–” Evan started. “It’s not like that, Benjy. I know you think it is, and I get it, but Barty and I have had each other’s backs all our lives. And though he is batshit insane sometimes, I have to put him first, because he would do the same for me.”

Benjy stayed silent for a moment, eyes searching Evan’s face.

“Loyalty. I can respect that, even if I don’t agree with it. You sure you weren’t supposed to be in Hufflepuff, Evan?”

Evan laughed. “Me? In Hufflepuff? I’m not nearly as sane as you think, Benjy.”

________________

Regardless of whatever he’d said to Benjy, Evan was, obviously, avoiding Barty. He actually wasn’t mad per se, though he wasn’t sure what that said about his own morality. If anything, he was more, just, confused. He didn’t understand what it was about Benjy that bothered Barty so much, except for the fact that he made Evan happy. And despite what he said, he really didn’t believe that Barty was so selfish that he wouldn’t want Evan to be happy. Right?

He was also, simply put, exhausted. Tired of having to ‘discover himself’, as Pandora put it, tired of dealing with Barty’s antics, tired of being the buffer between Barty and whoever he’d angered that day. It was all simply too much. So, as he always did when things just got too much, Evan decided to go for a smoke.

He arrived in the greenhouse around noon on Monday, pulling out a spliff he’d been storing for a special occasion (read: shitty day) in order to make himself feel better (read: get so high that he forgets about all his problems). Perhaps it wasn’t the healthiest of methods, but it sure was an effective one. 

Except, that is, when he was interrupted. Then the method wasn’t so effective. Especially when the interruption came from Remus Lupin.

“Mind if I join?” came a low voice from behind Evan.

Evan rolled his eyes. “If I say yes, will you go away?”

“I have those lavender spliffs you like.”

Well, he couldn’t argue with a good point like that. Evan shifted over, making space for Remus’s large frame next to him.

Remus handed him a spliff and Evan lit it wordlessly, taking a long drag and peering out through the greenhouse’s windows.

“Not that I’m not enjoying this whole silent act you’ve got going on,” Remus remarked, “but are you going to tell me why you’re skiving off class for an herbal remedy?”

Evan took another drag before replying. “Might be the most amount of words I’ve heard you say in one go, Lupin.”

“Nah, the most was probably when I had to sit up all night teaching your sorry arse how to…”

“Is there a reason you’re here, Remus?”

Remus sighed, as if talking to Evan wore him out. Evan supposed he now knew how everyone else felt talking to Evan. That was the problem with talking to Remus Lupin. In some ways, it was like Evan was looking in a mirror. Well, a slightly more sane, less irritable, and more swotty mirror. 

“Pandora saw you leaving the Great Hall. Asked me to follow you.”

“And here I was thinking you were simply concerned about my well-being. Pity.”

Remus chuckled, albeit a bit frustratedly. “Aren’t spliffs supposed to mellow you out?”

“This is me mellow.”

“Merlin help us all,” Remus said, lighting a spliff for himself and taking a puff. He glanced at Evan out of the corner of his eye, pretending to not look at Evan. Let the record show Remus Lupin, though a lot of things, was not an actor.

“If I tell you, will you stop doing that fucking side eye. It’s not your best look, Lupin.”

Remus nodded, as if inviting him to continue.

“I’m only telling you this because I’m too blasted to control my mouth.”

“Obviously.”

“Fuck, actually, this is a bad idea,” Evan said, mostly to himself. “He’ll find out.”

At this point, Evan couldn’t completely tell what he was saying out loud and what was in his head.

“And by he, you mean…” Remus prodded.

“Barty,” Evan snapped, irritable merely at the mention of his name.

“Ah,” Remus remarked, his words carrying a certain weight to them that Evan didn’t completely understand.

Rather than replying to that rather meaningless remark, Evan simply took another drag of his spliff. Merlin, Remus really did have some good weed.

“Is this about, erm, the Benjy thing?” Remus asked cautiously. 

“By the ‘Benjy thing’ do you mean when my absolute idiot of a best friend almost killed my ex-boyfriend just because he didn't like him and was bored?” 

Evan paused, realizing what he said. “I mean, ex-frie—”

Remus rolled his eyes. “Relax. You think I didn’t know? I saw you leave the third floor closet with him, and you come to the library with hickeys on your neck. I may be oblivious, but I’m not blind.”

Evan flushed. “And you don’t—”

“Care? Evan, remember who you’re speaking to.”

“Thanks,” Evan replied, struck by this odd alliance he’d struck up with a Gryffindor, of all people, over the years, but grateful nonetheless. 

“So I take it this is about Benjy?”

“It’s not just Benjy,” Evan explained. “It’s like Barty makes it his life’s mission to interfere with my life and my relationships. Whether I date girls or guys he finds a way to sabotage it. At first I thought it was for our stupid bet but now that’s over and he still has to meddle!”

Evan paused, slightly out of breath.

“Okay, I’m not even going to touch the whole bet thing—” Remus started.

“Good choice. You’d probably disapprove.”

“ — but, in terms of the Barty thing—”

“ —him being a massive asshole, you mean—”

“ —that I can help with.”

“How?” Evan asked, blankly.

“I’m dating Sirius, aren’t I? I went through the same thing.”

“That’s not the same thing. Sirius did it because he loved you. Barty just does it out of spite.”

Remus pursed his lips, as if holding something back. “Be that as it may, he flirts with you because he knows he’ll get a reaction out of you. He interferes with your relationships because he knows it’ll make you pay attention to him. Sirius used to do the same thing. He thinks that if you’re in a relationship, your banter and closeness and flirting will all go away. He’s jealous.”

“It’s not like that, Remus. Sure, Barty wants attention, but he doesn’t flirt with me for the reasons Sirius did. He’s not jealous of the people I’m dating, he’s jealous of me. He wants all of them to pay attention to him, and when they talk to me, he loses.”

“Let me ask you something, Evan,” Remus began. “Does Barty do that to Pandora’s boyfriends?”

“No,” Evan replied, “but I don’t see how–”

“How about Regulus? Does Barty interfere with his dates?”

“Not really, but–”

“And Dorcas? That is, before Marlene?”

“No–”

“And does he flirt with the rest of them the way he does with you?”

“No, but that’s just because–”

“Think about it, Evan. He flirts with you, all the time. He has a line of girls who would jump at the chance to date him, to flirt with him, yet he never stays in relationships. At every party, he leaves to go chat up girls, but he always ends up back next to you. And when you try to date, he interferes, no matter who it is. He says that no one is good enough for you. Except clearly, he thinks he is. So tell me, Evan, how is your situation so different from mine?”

It was eerily similar to what Benjy had said on that one ill-fated night. It was ridiculous, probably. He didn’t buy into Remus’s notions of secret affection — the brunette had been corrupted by silly ideas of love ever since he fell head over heels for Sirius Black. But Evan would admit that some of what Remus had said stuck with him. 

Why did Barty cling to Evan so much, much more than he did any of their other friends? Evan had always simply called it a ‘special friendship’, something only the two of them shared. But why is it that they were able to be so much closer, practically connected? And, as much as it confused Evan to admit, he felt more whole, more alive with Barty than he did with anyone else on Earth. Even when he had been shagging Benjy, it was only a fraction of what he felt when he was sparring, or joking, or sleeping alongside Barty. 

Was it romantic, though? Evan rather didn’t think so. Because, if he was romantically into Barty, he would’ve realized it a long time ago. If he was romantically into Barty, Barty would’ve been his sexual awakening, not Benjy. But no, Evan had seen Barty shirtless a thousand times, brushed hands with him a thousand more, and yet he’d never thought about it.

Until, perhaps, now.

Walking to supper later that day, Evan’s thoughts drifted to Barty. Evan loved Barty, the way that a best friend did. Nothing more. It couldn’t be.

“Evan?” he heard softly, still lost in his thoughts. Evan looked up to see Barty, cautiously reaching for the gravy. “Could you?”

Evan passed him the boat, their fingers grazing as he did. And, sure, Evan felt a slight warmth run through him, but he was bound to feel that with any touch.

“Are you okay?” Barty asked cautiously, his brown eyes peering at Evan.

Merlin, he really was beautiful, though. If Evan let him admit it to himself, Barty was attractive, sinfully so. He had never needed to admit it, because it was as plainly obvious as the sun is to the Earth. He didn’t need a map nor a compass to discover Barty’s brown eyes, eyes that laid Evan out bare and stripped him down to his very soul. When Barty looked at Evan, that perpetual feeling of drifting escaped him, and Evan felt tethered to the ground, no longer wandering away. Barty was home, he was safe. 

But, Barty was also decidedly not safe. Because, as Evan sat there, stupidly scooping potatoes into his mouth, he let his eyes wander over Barty’s, eyes that were safe and home but also full of danger, the kind of eyes that you would meet and know that they would inevitably hurt you but need them in your life regardless. His high cheekbones, the result of years of wizarding nobility, and that dimple in his left cheek that seemed to add an air of mischief to his aristocratic features. His olive coloring, an homage to his mother’s Spanish heritage. And those sinful lips, dressed with their perpetual smirk, that should have scared Evan away but instead drew him in further. Lips that, Evan admitted to himself, were infinitely sexier when Barty spoke Spanish. Fuck, Evan loved when Barty spoke Spanish.

This was when Evan realized that these were decidedly unplatonic thoughts to be having about your best friend, so he made a choice to stop.

If Evan was actually attracted to Barty, he would know it. And he didn’t, so he wasn’t.

Whatever made him sleep at night.