Timeless

Regulus

I had nearly kissed him. As I chased him down, as we drenched each other in every shade of colour we could find all I could think of was how I had nearly kissed that idiot and it had taken just the first festival. 

This was a horrible idea, this whole thing, me letting him, James Fucking Potter of all people, show me life. 

But then. Then he had drenched me in that colour and fled through the crowd. So maybe he doesn't even like me like that anyway. He could've been attracted to the girl I presented myself as, if even that. Probably not even that. If he did he'd have flirted. Merlin, if he did he'd have kissed me. 

I might've kissed him back.

I might've kissed him if he hadn't run.

No. Goddammit. I would not have kissed him back, I'd have killed him. I'd made a no-touching rule, rightly, and I needed to stick to it. It wasn't a rule just he had to follow, I had to just the same. Fuck this was going to end horribly.

And the worst part was that I couldn't make myself leave either.

I'd had a day, felt more alive than I ever had. I'd actually felt alive. Surely it was enough. We were now in the kitchen of the house he had here, evidently, eating food he picked us up on the way and I hadn't dared to look up from my meal. 

I would just leave after dinner. I should. I'd gotten a taste of life, it was dangerous and I should be heading home.

But I couldn't, for whatever godforsaken reason, I couldn't go back home now.

Shit.

I was out of food and had no excuse to avoid looking at him anymore. I was terrified to. I was scared of him not seeming interested, which he shouldn't and I didn't want him to, but even more so I was terrified of me losing control of my own damn self. Since when were my emotions out of control?!

He wasn't looking at me when I peeked up, though, he was staring at his own plate and grinning like a crazy person. I wanted to ask why. Wanted to be part of that joy. But I was not even supposed to be here and if I wanted to stay for even a day or two more, let alone weeks, I had to pull myself together. I forced down whatever was bubbling in me. He was a menace and I needed to stick to that knowledge, an incontrovertible fact, not an opinion. 

“Where are the guest bedrooms?” I disrupted his gleeful thinking. 

“Oh, right,” he muttered, some type of realisation washing over his face, “well, um, actually there's just one bedroom. One bed. You can have it though, I'll sleep on the floor.”

“But it's? Your house?”

“Yeah,” he shrugged as if that was the most pointless argument, “and you're the guest.”

I stared at him grabbing the plates from the table to let the sink do the washing, unsure of how to react. If anyone had ever suggested to my parents that if we didn't have room they'd sleep on the floor and give their bed to a guest they would have murdered or at least seriously maimed these guests probably. 

Even Sirius would not take the floor for me that one time his room was under construction after he flooded it, and that had been my bedroom. We'd ended up sharing the bed, but that was not because I let him in too but because he allowed me in. 

And here was James, shrugging and giving me his bed as if it was the smallest thing, as if it didn't even matter, as if giving up his own comfort for me was nothing. Nobody had ever put me first before, ever, and I cursed fates for him and now being the first to put me on a piedestal. 

He had mingled with ministry to get me a chance to attend my brother's wedding. He had seen through my attempt of running when the wedding had made me feel alone and he had brought me here, where I'd spent the whole day laughing and smiling. I had never in my life before spent the whole day laughing and smiling.

Merlin fuck. Why was I feeling like this? All warm and fuzzy on the inside? This couldn't be happening, surely? This must be just the food and not me actually having feelings for James Potter?” 

“Maybe I should go,” I forced myself to say, because I should've been going earlier already, “Thanks for the festival,” I bolted for the door before I had a chance to change my mind.

James' fingers wrapped around my arm, stopping me right in my tracks, and I turned to look at him. He was hurt.

“Reggie, please,” he sighed, let go and fell with his side against the doorway like some handsome god. For fucks sake, what the hell was going on with me!?!? I shook my head, “Regulus, you said two weeks, not one day. So, let's get you to bed, shall we?”

“What?” was I breathing? Nope. No, I was not. I forced myself to breathe out, which turned out to be a rather abrupt exhale. 

“To the bedroom. I'll show you where the bedroom is. Okay?”

“Oh. Right. Yes,”

He laughed as he walked past me. I focused on breathing, on putting one foot in front of the other, and on definitely not thinking because that was only causing issues and I needed to get through all of this somehow and he was not making it easy. 

The bed was big and comfortable and yet I could not fall asleep for the life of me. For the record, neither could James it seemed, he kept tossing and turning from one side to the other on the floor.

“For Merlin's sake, just come to the bed,” the words left my lips before my brain caught on and my hand flew to my mouth in horror. Had I really just said that?!

James bolted upright, his face as much in shock as mine must've been, although less horrified-looking.

“You sure?” he asked. His glasses were still on his face, but they sat pretty much diagonally across it, making me want to laugh at how ridiculous he looked. And yet still not ridiculous enough for me to get ahold of my senses.

“Sure,” I sighed and rolled myself over to the other side of the bed, too tired to get in another fight with myself, “you gotta wear these though,” I pulled a pair of gloves on my own hands and handed one to him after, “and I hope you're wearing long-sleeves, long pants and socks. No way for us to accidentally touch as we sleep,”

“Right,” he nodded as he pulled his set of gloves on and let his wand work on his sleepwear for it to cover as much as possible of his gorgeous brown skin. I shook my head and flopped back down, focusing on the plain white ceiling instead of staring while he slid between the sheets with me.

“James?” I found myself liking his name on my lips.

“Hm?”

“I can't sleep,” I turned my head, just the head, to face him, glasses still wonky and hair a curly mess. My parents would choke and die if they saw the two of us here right now and yet I could not stop the growing warmth inside me as I looked at him, carefully on the other side of the bed, hands gloved just for me, “tell me something about India, something I probably don't know,”

James looked thoughtful for a few minutes and I wondered if he was ever going to respond, but then he spoke “The festival you saw, experienced today is called the Holi festival. There are two legends that are tied to it. One speaks of how an evil king, called Hiranyakashyap, who tried to forbid his son Prahlad from worshipping a god called Vishnu. The thing is, Prahlad, the son, rejected his father's orders and unfair demands. The king got angry, obviously, and tried several times to kill his son, but failed. He then ordered his own sister, a demon called Holika, who was immune to fire, to sit on a pyre with Prahlad on her lap. When the flames struck, Holika burnt to death despite her immunity to fire, but Prahlad came out perfectly fine. He had known it was wrong what his father had ordered him to do and ignored it, called upon the Lord Vishnu for help, and survived thanks to it,”

I thought about my parents and how easily I'd agreed to whatever they'd asked me, any time they did, and how that'd ended me up betrothed to my uncle with no way out. But if I'd said anything, they'd have been furious, “What happened to the father? Wasn't he angry?”

“Of course he was. He was so pissed he destroyed a pillar and then the Lord Vishnu came to protect Prahlad and defeated him. It was never him alone against his father, even when he may have felt like it was.”

I didn't have a response. I wasn't sure whether he was on purpose making it sound like something that could be applied to my life, but either way, he didn't know the full circumstances. Wasn't aware that my choice, if I ever had one, had been taken, because I had been alone. Sirius hadn't taken me with him, hadn't even told me he was going at all. If I'd said no to my parents now, they would have tortured me until I either died or agreed and nobody would have come to save me. And now I was physically tied to the wedding and family duties and didn't have a way out through anyone's help. Not even a god's, if one existed. 

“Do you want me to tell the second legend as well or should we just go to sleep?”

“No,” I shook my head, liking the sound of his voice next to me, “tell me more.”

And so he did. He told me about the demon who tried to poison a child and how the kid ended up with blue skin. Told me about how he then felt unloved because of his different shade of skin from his beloved, feeling unlovable, and how his mother told him to paint his beloved's face whatever colour he chose, so he did. 

And somewhere along the way sleep found me.