bad idea, right?

As usual, it was Reggie’s fault.

Ah, Barty never got tired of saying that.

This time, though, it really was all Regulus’s fault. It was Regulus who went and fucked it all up to the point that the Slytherins were now throwing a Halloween party, of all things.

Actually, no. It wasn’t all Regulus’s fault. It was also James Potter’s.

Because, of course, when James had approached Reggie in the Great Hall, presumably to invite him to the Gryffindor Halloween party, and asked him what his plans were for the holiday, Regulus, the absolute idiot, had to clam up and announce that they were hosting a Halloween party. And, James Potter, always infuriatingly eager, suggested that they combineparties, because why spread out the fun, and Regulus, blushing furiously and apparently gone even more insane, agreed, and Dorcas, ever the instigator, suggested they host it in the Slytherin common room, of all places. And that was why, the night before Halloween, Barty was moving the orange lanterns Pandora had ordered him to enchant to the top of the room.

Barty had to give it to Pandora, though – she had a knack for decorating. Somehow, she’d taken the Slytherin common room, a space no one would ever call cozy nor festive, and turned it into a room that, in 24 short hours, would be filled with Hogwarts students of all houses. This was the first time Barty could remember that all four houses had attended a Slytherin party – usually they were restricted to only Slytherins and a few choice Ravenclaws – and though he knew it would most likely be a disaster, he’d admit that he was a little bit excited to see the chaos that unfolded as a result.

For example, Regulus’s increasingly obvious infatuation with James Potter. One that he vehemently denied.

“Oi, Reggie! Think your boyfriend would like to see you in a tutu tomorrow? I heard ballerina costumes are all the rage,” Barty called out to Regulus, who was hanging soft string lights across the mantel with Dorcas.

“I don’t know, Barty. Are you planning on wearing a mask to the party, or will your face do the trick? Good thing first years aren’t invited, you’d probably give them nightmares,” Regulus shot back.

“Hey! Evan likes my face, don’t you, Ev?”

Evan looked up at him from where he was carving pumpkins with delicate flicks of his wand. Merlin, his magic was beautiful. It had always had such a quiet, yet remarkable air to it.

“Sure, Barty,” Evan replied smoothly, yet his usual teasing tone wasn’t in it. He met Barty’s eyes for only a moment, before returning to the task at hand.

Barty wasn’t quite sure what was happening with Evan. He’d been hurt after the Quidditch match, really hurt. He’d felt as if he’d betrayed Evan, and worse, that he didn’t deserve him. In all honesty, that feeling hadn’t gone away. Barty knew that he didn’t deserve Evan. Salazar, he’d known that the first time he met the boy, so many years ago. He supposed it was inevitable that Evan would figure that out too.

But Evan hadn’t lashed out at him, the way he usually did. He didn’t make passive aggressive remarks, nor ignore him, nor enchant his tongue so all his food was too spicy (long story). No, Evan just tolerated him. And if anything, that was worse. He could always count on Evan to feel something toward him. Whether it was a full-blown argument or total silence, at least Barty knew it meant he cared.

Except now, Evan was just acting, well, completely neutral. He’d reply to Barty’s quips, start polite conversation, edit his essays like usual. But he seemed to have forgotten completely about the Benjy incident, as Barty was calling it in his head, leaving Barty waiting for a chastisement that still hadn’t come. He would get flustered when Barty spoke to him, as if uncomfortable with the attention. Did he not want Barty to talk to him? Was he disgusted, or worse, afraid of him? Yet Barty caught Evan peeking over his dinner plate or textbooks now and then, searching for something in Barty’s face that Barty was pretty sure he wouldn’t find. For if it was some sort of redeeming quality, that might make Evan realize that Barty was worth it, worth his time and energy, then Barty was afraid he would never find it.

And so, unsurprisingly, the next 24 hours passed very similarly, with Evan treating Barty as if they were casual acquaintances, rather than, well, everything.

A side effect of this casualness was Barty’s complete lack of knowledge of Evan’s Halloween costume. Even the night of, when Evan disappeared into the bathroom to get changed, Barty had no idea what he would come out as.

“Barty, what was that charm that turned your eyes blue last Halloween?” Dorcas called out from across the room. 

They were all getting reading in the boys’ room, since they had the most mirror space. Plus, Dorcas and Pandora were inevitably borrowing the boys’ clothes, and the boys were inevitably borrowing Dorcas and Pandora’s jewelry. They had a good little system going on.

“I can do it for you, Cas,” Barty said, walking over to her. 

“Oculi Caeruli” he uttered, tapping his wand to her temple. Dorcas’s eyes turned a turquoise blue.

“You look awesome, Cas,” Pandora said, admiring Dorcas’s costume. She’d dressed as a mermaid, hence the blue eyes, and she wore a dark green mesh top (Barty’s, bought to piss his father off back in fourth year) and a deep blue skirt that she’d enchanted to have glowing scales. She was wearing a pair of dark green boots, and Pandora was right, she did look awesome.

“You definitely wear that top better than Barty does,” Regulus, of course, had to put in.

“I resent that,” Barty started, “but you do look cool as fuck.”

“And what, pray tell, are you supposed to be?” Regulus asked, dramatic as ever.

Barty had decided to go as a vampire, and he wore dark jeans and a black button up, the first few buttons undone to display a blood-red amulet he’d nicked from Pandora. Fake blood dripped from the corners of his mouth, and he’d grown his canine teeth a little longer and pointier for the occasion. He’d asked Dorcas to smear some eyeliner around his eyes, and she’d done a mix of red and black that made him look convinced half-dead. 

“I’m a vampire, obviously. What are you, a dork?”

“These are my normal clothes.”

“My point stands.”

Barty turned to help Pandora clasp her necklace. She was dressed as a fairy, and she looked absolutely stunning in a short purple dress and a pair of wings she’d sprouted from her back with a charm. Her hair was threaded with silver beads and emeralds, and she really did look magical. Granted, they were always magical, but Pandora had a sort of otherworldly magic to her tonight.

As Barty fussed with his hair, Regulus too got changed, dressed in all-black and a dark green jacket. He’d attached bolts to his neck, for some odd reason, and added some dark makeup around his eyes. He claimed he was Frankenstein, which Barty vaguely recalled was some muggle book he’d seen Evan reading. 

Impatient, Barty knocked on the bathroom door, needing to steal Regulus’s coconut oil for his hair.

“Evan, you done?” he called out.

“One second,” Evan replied, his voice muffled through the door. 

When Evan opened the bathroom door, Barty got deja vu for the day, not so long ago, that Evan had walked out of that bathroom with his stupid blonde hair. This moment, though, was that time a thousand.

Evan was dressed as an angel. Barty supposed he could make a good joke about it, something about being dressed like an angel but the devil in disguise, but unfortunately, his brain was currently short-circuiting.

He wore white pants, those bell bottoms that were in style for the time and that Barty would’ve considered silly on anyone else but looked so perfect on Evan that he thought he might die of not ingesting enough oxygen. He wore a white shirt, tight and sleeveless, and Barty’s mouth went dry at the sight of his arms, lightly toned and practically carved out of bronze. Like Pandora, he’d sprouted a pair of soft feathered wings from his back, and he’d enchanted a halo to rest just above his head. He hadn’t touched anything else though. The rest of it was just him, it was just Evan. Perfect, beautiful Evan.

Years later, when people asked Barty about the moment he realized he loved Evan Rosier, he wished he would say that the birds started singing, or the heavens opened up and shone on him, or that a million firecrackers went off within him. He wished he could say he wrote some sort of sonnet, that he then composed verse upon verse about his unrequited love.

But that wasn’t how it went.

At that moment, Barty only had one thought.

Holy fuck. I want Evan Rosier. 

Which was followed by: No, I need Evan Rosier. 

Barty didn’t think he had ever needed someone as strongly as he needed Evan at that moment. Because it’s not that he didn’t know Evan was attractive before, because he had eyes, but it was more that he realized that he didn’t see Evan as just passably attractive. No, Barty wanted to rake his eyes slowly over Evan’s tall figure, he wanted to to be pinned to a wall by his broad chest, he wanted to kiss that infuriating smirk off of his face. Merlin, Barty wanted to kiss him so badly.

Barty, like an idiot, pushed past Evan and slammed the door to the bathroom shut. He was alone. Fuck, he was alone and he was an idiot. Why was he in here, when Evan was outside, looking like that?

He stared up at himself in the mirror, but all he could see was Evan, with that one strip of dark torso peeking out from under his shirt, with that rose earring, with his surveilling eyes that would be able to see through Barty in one minute.

Fuck, he was so screwed.

Get yourself together, Crouch, he said to his reflection. He could do this. He could walk out of this bathroom and pretend that he didn’t want to maul Evan, to attach himself to Evan’s perfect lips and never let—

He was getting distracted. He couldn’t do that. No, Barty had to stay focused. He’d just gotten Evan to act semi-normal around him, they’d been fighting the entire semester. He couldn’t go and fuck things up again.

He took a breath and opened the door.

“You okay, Barty?” Evan said, his eyebrows knitted together in an endearing way that Barty tried so hard to ignore.

“Fine, thanks,” Barty replied curtly. He couldn’t do this, he couldn’t stand in front of Evan and not tell him how devastatingly beautiful he thought he was.

Barty saw Evan’s face fall at his words. Fuck. He was such an idiot. Now he’d gone and made Evan sad. He hated himself for even breathing the same air as him. How had it taken him so long to realize?

“You look nice,” Barty said softly, struggling to hide the affection in his tone. “Not just nice, I mean, you look, fuck–”

“You look good, too, Barty,” Evan said, uncharacteristically soft as well. 

“Really?” he asked, because apparently he was an idiot who couldn’t just take a compliment and move on.

Evan colored slightly, and Barty hoped it was from his compliment, but knew it was probably because of how much Regulus had heated the room that afternoon.

“You always look good, Barty,” he whispered.

Well, fuck him. Evan wasn’t making this whole forget-your-best-friend-is-insanely-hot thing any easier. Curse him for being so fucking sweet all the time.

“Yeah, well, I couldn’t let Regulus be the most handsome in the room tonight. Wouldn’t want Potter to get too overwhelmed?”

Regulus threw a book at him.

“What the fuck? That could’ve killed me!”

Regulus rolled his eyes. Barty hoped they got stuck up there. “It was a paperback.”

“You could’ve smudged my makeup!”

“Can’t look any worse than it already does,” Regulus replied.

“Pandora and Evan liked it,” Barty protested.

“Pandora is a sweetheart and Evan–” Regulus stopped himself.

“What?” Barty asked.

“Nothing, don’t worry about it.”

Weird.

The door opened and Dorcas peeked her head through.

“You lot ready? Pandora needs help with the finishing touches.”

And because they were all too deathly afraid to keep Pandora waiting, Pandora who they all knew could hex them to Sunday if she really wanted to, they headed for the common room.

________________________

The party was in full swing, and Barty was just miserable.

Correction: Barty had been just miserable. Then he took a couple shots. Now he was mostly drunk and only slightly miserable.

Thank Merlin for alcohol.

The object of his misery was currently standing across the room, somehow looking downright sinful in his angel costume, chatting up some Ravenclaw whose name Barty didn’t know. He hated him anyway.

He knew he couldn’t be an arsehole (again) and interrupt them, even though he wanted to snap the fingers off the unnamed Ravenclaw. Let the record show he was staying away for Evan’s sake only. He really could make Barty do anything, even without trying.

“Reggie,” he said, swaying a little on his feet. Perhaps he was drunker than he thought. “How’re you doing this lovely night?”

“Three shots in?”

“Four.”

Regulus laughed. “How are you going to embarrass me tonight?”

Barty sprawled on the couch next to him. His eyes once again caught on Evan and that guy, whose hand was now tracing Evan’s arm. Who the fuck did he think he was? 

“Who’s that?” Barty demanded, nodding his head at the Ravenclaw.

“Fuller. Corbin Fuller.”

What an idiotic name. 

Regulus snorted. Fuck, had he said that out loud?

“Let him be, Barty. You can’t be selfish, Evan’s allowed to have other friends.”

“He doesn’t look like a friend,” Barty grumbled.

Regulus turned to him, peering at Barty curiously. “And that’s a problem, because…”

“It’s not.”

“I know you, Bartemius. Try again.”

“It’s just,” Barty hesitated. He wasn’t sure if he was ready to come out, or whatever, to Regulus yet. Merlin, he didn’t even know what he was. All he knew was this overwhelming sense that that guy shouldn’t be standing so close to Evan, and it should be him instead. His arm on Evan’s waist, his eyes on Evan’s.

“Yes,” Regulus prodded.

“Don’t you think they don’t look good together? Evan’s way too tall for him.”

“Fuller’s the same height as you,” Regulus said pointedly.

“Why does that matter?” Barty replied defensively. Fuck, was Reggie onto him? In his drunken state, Barty wasn’t quite sure how subtle he was being. Then again, he was practically ogling Evan across the room, so probably not subtle at all.

Regulus rolled his eyes. “Come and talk to me when you aren’t drunk and in denial, Barty.” And he stood up and walked away. Away, Barty noticed, toward James Potter, who was standing conveniently alone near the drinks table.

Suddenly, it was all too much. The party, the (albeit good) record collection that was blasting from a player belonging to Remus Lupin, all the people crowding around Barty that were probably all fine and good but just not Evan. He needed some space. Better yet, he needed a smoke.

He walked up the stairs to their dorm, grateful for its close proximity. He fished a pack of cigarettes from his bedside table, then went to sit on the open windowsill, feet dangling. He loved it here, just watching the stars over the forest, the quiet sounds of the party below him. He smelled cigarette smoke and cold almost-winter air and the sandalwood perfume Regulus sprayed in the room, and Barty felt safe, amongst all the familiar smells. He wasn’t sure what he was safe from, but he was safe.

He heard the door creak behind him as he took another puff. Barty turned to see Evan, flushed from the alcohol, or perhaps blushing from talking to stupid Corbin Fuller, a faint smile on his lips.

Barty couldn’t do it. He couldn’t be alone with him, only having realized how attracted to Evan he was and confused about what that meant and unable to ignore it, at least not while he was so drunk. He wordlessly stubbed out his cigarette and walked towards the door.

“Where are you going?” Evan asked from behind him.

Barty turned, unable to meet his eyes, nor stare at his lips. He settled for a spot just below his chin.

“Back to the party. Just needed a smoke quickly.”

“I need one, too. Wanna keep me company while I do?”

It was a peace offering, Barty knew. It was more than he probably deserved, after everything he’d done the past few months. But Barty was a one-track-minded motherfucker. And so, of course, he opened his impulsive mouth and said,

“Why don’t you ask Fuller to keep you company? You seemed cozy.”

Evan looked confused. “Corbin? How did yo–”

“Fenwick, now Fuller. You’ve got bad taste, Ev. Is mind-numbingly boring your type?”

“Sorry, I didn’t realize I had asked your opinion on my sex life,” Evan bit back, agitated now.

“Sex life? That’s generous, sweetheart,” Barty replied, knowing he was poking the bear but too drunk, or perhaps just too Barty, to care. 

“What the fuck is your problem, Crouch?” Evan shot back, stalking towards him.

Fuck, was it bad that he was even more attracted to Evan than before? Maybe he was masochistic, but Evan was breathing hard and practically growling, and Barty had never wanted someone more. Nobody gave it back to Barty the way that he did. And Barty fucking loved it.

“You and your god-awful taste in men is my problem,” Barty said, no longer able to control his mouth.

Evan furrowed a brow, as if something had clicked inside him.

“And why is that?” he whispered, slowly, coming to stand right in front of Barty.

“Makes us look bad,” Barty spit at him.

“I didn’t realize my reputation meant so much to you,” Evan drawled, taking a step forward, forcing Barty to back up against the door. 

“I didn’t realize you were so desperate to shag someone that you’d choose the first guy who looked at you twice,” Barty snapped.

Evan’s eyes flashed. “And what was I supposed to do, wait for you?”

“What?” Barty said, momentarily dumbfounded.

Evan shifted a moment, seemingly regretting what he said.

“What?” Barty asked again.

“You can’t flirt with me, and touch me, and act like you own me, Barty. You don’t want me like that, and you need to stop acting like it. It’s not fair,” Evan said, staring Barty straight in the eye. His voice wavered slightly and, for the first time, Barty realized that Evan was just as drunk as him.

“That’s not the point–” Barty started.

“Isn’t it?” Evan asked, a little cruelly. It made Barty want him even more. “You want me to be there, like a puppy on a fucking leash, who you can flirt with whenever you’re between girls. But Merlin forbid I find someone else, because then you suddenly care.”

“That’s not—”

“That’s not what, Crouch?” Evan said, raising a brow. “You can say all you want about my sex life, but at the end of the day, you’re not part of it. At least Corbin can say differently.”

That was when Barty lost it. Evan standing there, pure anger in his eyes, a crazed smile upon his lips. Barty need him, now.

“We’ll fucking see about that,” he muttered, wrapping a hand around Evan’s neck and pulling him down towards him.

Their lips smashed together, and it wasn’t sweet and innocent like a first kiss with someone was supposed to be. It was cruel, and carnal, Evan biting down on Barty’s lips hard enough to draw blood and Barty reveling in every second of it.

No one had ever gotten him like this. Girls had always kissed him too smoothly, as if kissing was some sort of elegant dance. With Evan, it was instinctive, it was pain and pure bliss all at the same time.

Evan looped one arm around Barty’s waist and the other against the door, pressing Barty against him. He pressed a knee between Barty’s legs and leaned in further, and Barty felt like he had that night Evan had given him a hickey, only one million times more.

“Fuck you, Barty,” Evan growled, biting down against Barty’s neck. His head fell back, every nerve in his body standing up and bowing to Evan’s mouth.

A smirk fell over Barty’s lips. “I think that’s your job, Rosier,” he said through a breath.

Evan shut him up with a kiss, clasping Barty’s throat with one ring-laden hand and squeezing.

“You wanna keep being funny?” he asked, meeting Barty’s gaze.

He hadn’t expected Evan to be like this, so controlling and cruel. It made Barty like him even more. He really was fucked up.

Barty shook his head no, and their lips crashed together again. Barty grabbed hold of Evan and turned them around, backing them up towards Evan’s bed. 

Halfway there, Evan pulled out of the kiss, eyes blazing. He blinked a few times, as if remembering where he was.

Barty immediately missed Evan’s body on his, his lips on his own. He whined, trying to pull back towards Evan.

“Fuck, this was a bad idea.”

Was it? Barty was too drunk to tell. How could something that felt that good be a bad idea?

“You’re drunk,” Evan said, “and you aren’t even into guys.”

Barty stood there, unable to say anything.

“You’ll regret this tomorrow, Barty.”

“But will you?” Barty asked, apparently self-sabotaging.

Evan sighed, running a hand across his face. “I already do.”

Oh. It was a mistake, then. A fluke. Evan didn’t find Barty attractive, not like that. Of course he didn’t. Barty was an idiot for thinking that he did.

“Yeah, you’re right,” Barty said, though his voice sounded hollow, “this was a big mistake.”

“Barty,” Evan said, though Barty couldn’t detect the tone in his voice.

“S’fine Evan,” Barty cut in, turning towards his bed, “go back to Corbin. You two are perfect for each other.”

He heard the door slam behind him, and when he turned, Evan was gone.

Barty fell into his bed, not bothering to take off his costume. 

It never happened, he told himself. Because he knew that, if he let himself remember it, it would drive him crazy. So, he supposed, it was better to just forget.

It never happened, he repeated, until he fell asleep.