come as you are

3

There is a table at the back of the library that Regulus found during his first year at Hogwarts. It’s a table secluded from the others, in between the furthest bookshelves and pressed up near the window, giving a clear and sometimes intriguing view of the Hogwarts grounds. Other students don’t seem to often occupy the table, and as Regulus spends hours in the library at a time, he almost always manages to find it free.

Pandora finds him during the evening. She comes bundling over with her arms filled with books and face as bright as always.

"Evening," she says. "I didn’t see you at dinner. Did you get anything to eat?"

Regulus nods. "I had a big lunch, so I’m not hungry yet. Did I miss anything decent?"

"Nothing to lose focus over," she smiles as she sits down opposite him. She eyes the parchment in front of him on the table. "Charms homework?"

Regulus nods again. He’d just finished rewriting his class notes into a much more neater and organised manor like he always does, and now he’s going to get a head start on the charms work Flitwick assigned that morning. He wants to get all of his outstanding assignments done so he can enjoy some time this evening reading more about dragon legends as he hasn’t had a chance to finish his book yet.

"He wants us to come up with three feet of house-hold charm ideas," he says, though he doesn’t know why he bothers to explain as Pandora is likely to have the same assignment.

"Yes, I need to do that too," she nods. "Have you thought of any yet?"

"A hair removing charm, a charm to allow your wand to be used as an alarm clock, a charm to allow a quill or a pen to never run out of ink," Regulus says. What about a walking on water charm? No, that has nothing to do with muggle households. What muggle needs to walk on water?

Pandora nods. "What about a lawn mowing charm? Freddie was moaning last night about his dad making him do it over summer."

Regulus scrawls that down too. He chews on the end of his quill in thought, a habit he’s never been able to kick despite his mothers judgment for the mundane and improper action.

Silence settles between them. Apart from the occasional idea Pandora supplies, they barely speak. Regulus is fine with that. He comes to the library for quiet after all, as it’s sometimes hard to get it in the Ravenclaw common room and it’s always more cramped to study in his dorm room.

"Pandora!" Someone calls suddenly, and Regulus eyes flick up through his hair to look at the people approaching the table. Oh no. "We figured we’d find you here. Can we sit?"

"Of course!" Pandora smiles, moving her books so Lily, Marlene and Dorcas can sit down.

Regulus looks down at his parchment and unconsciously goes back to chewing the end of his quill.

They’re here for Pandora. Which is fine. He can totally handle people sitting at the table. It’s not like he has to talk to them. He doesn’t mind people talking around him, as long as it doesn’t go on for too long.

He thinks about more charms. A charm to make water boil? He writes that down, that could be handy when cooking.

"Regulus, is it?"

Regulus looks up, and all four sets of eyes are on him.

"Hello," he says. Out of pure politeness, though hesitance, he holds his hand out. "Regulus Black."

"I’m Lily," she smiles, as if she needed introducing. Regulus is sure there isn’t a single person in the school that doesn’t know the darling Lily Evans, especially now she’s Head Girl. "This is Marlene and Dorcas."

Regulus nods in greeting. He goes back to his parchment, but clearly his physical dismissal of the will to participate isn’t enough for the Gryffindor girl.

"How do you know Pandora?" Lily asks.

Regulus looks back up, feeling his palms break out in a sweat. This is going horribly. Why haven’t they sat down and just spoken to Pandora?

He meets Pandora’s eyes across the table. He’s taking too long to answer. This is getting embarrassing.

"We met on the train when we were first years," Pandora explains for him.

"Lovely," Lily smiles, and it seems so genuine. How does someone barely of age manage to smile with the warmth of a dotting mother? 

"Why haven’t you ever introduced us, Pandora?" Marlene asks. "If you’ve been friends for so long."

"Never had the opportunity," Pandora shrugs. There was that, and also that Regulus didn’t enjoy being talked about or talked to, and Pandora has been kind enough to respect that privacy for five years.

Pandora does quick work at talking to the girls, so Regulus takes advantage to focus back on his work again. He doesn’t mind people speaking around him, it’s just when they talk to him he gets tired of it quickly.

It’s just that Regulus doesn’t have much to say. He enjoys the quiet. He enjoys the peace that comes with it, the calm. He enjoys the lack of attention, the lack of pressure to make people like him and deal with the consequences if they don’t. When he stays out of peoples way, when he keeps to himself and doesn’t have too many opportunities to mess up and be noticed, life runs smoothly.

Plus, he has homework to do and stay on top of, and books to read and things outside of class to learn.

He doesn’t have time for people as well.

He’s got another 10 charm ideas down when the table was interrupted again. Really, Regulus shouldn’t be surprised it’s happened again, but he was. More so when he notices it’s Remus Lupin and Potter.

"Hey, guys," Remus greets. "Why are we sat back here?"

"We came to sit with Pandora and Regulus. It’s quiet back here, very nice," Lily replies.

"It’s a nifty spot, actually," Marlene nods. "Far enough away from everyone that we can talk too without getting caught."

Yes, brilliant, Regulus thinks.

Remus nods at Regulus when he sits down in the seat at the head of the table. "Alright?"

Regulus nods. Then he notices Potter standing at his side.

"Hello!" James smiles, showcasing a line of straight, pearly white teeth. He extends his hand, "I'm James."

"I know," Regulus replies instantly, than mentally slaps himself because of how rude he sounded. He holds out his hand, praying that the heat in his cheeks isn't noticeable though he knows it most definitely is, "Regulus."

Regulus hates how soft his voice sounds, but he blames it on the environment of the library and despite Marlene's judgement that their in a corner where they can freely talk, the essence of a quiet library still factors in as to that is why Regulus' voice is as soft and gentle as cotton. Not because he's talking to James.

James laughs, though it doesn't sound like he's laughing cruelly at Regulus. "I know."

James' hand is warm but not sweaty, his grip surprisingly soft for someone who seems to have no shame in roughhousing his friends in the corridors and plays Quidditch like it's life or death, and Regulus can't help but be surprised at how much larger his hands are compared to Regulus'. Regulus doesn't think he has small hands, but it almost startles him at the difference when it feels like James' hand is big enough to make the sight of his completely disappear.

Regulus pulls away first, his whole arm tingling and thoughts how scrambled. He goes back to his homework, trying to reign in the spiralling thoughts about James' hands and instead getting back to the task he's meant to thinking about.

Then the unthinkable happens.

Regulus almost falls out of his seat in surprise when James sits next to him. He keeps his eyes on the table, but he knows that anyone that looks at him will be able to notice the sudden stiffening of his entire frame. His cheeks feel like their burning, his eyes wide and frozen because James has sat down.

Why has he done that? James never comes to the library, and he certainly doesn't come to the library to study.

Regulus looks out the window. Everything seems normal, the world hasn't turned into a burning inferno, there is no apocalypse or meteor obliterating the earth. There is no physical explanation for this strange turn of events, just the chaos currently reigning inside Regulus' head.

Regulus is torn between stopping himself from screaming at them to go away and ignoring the voice in his head telling himself to run away.

Regulus tells himself to calm down. No one is looking at him. Apart from Pandora. And James, Remus, Lily, and the other girls. No one in the library is looking their way. In fact, no one seems to have noticed at all. Which is strange, because James especially seems to attract a lot of attention simply by entering a room.

"So, Regulus," James starts, "are you going to try-out for the Quidditch team this year? I heard the seeker position is available in Ravenclaw now, and Sirius has always said you’re a great flyer."

Regulus just shakes his head, not trusting his voice to work.

"That’s a shame," James pouts. Actually pouts! As if Regulus choosing to not participate is hurting the Gryffindor personally. "What about—"

"Potter, shut up," Lily grumbles. "We don’t want to hear about bloody Quidditch."

"I’m just trying to make conversation!" James defends, and he genuinely sounds so hurt at the snap from Evans.

Regulus is suddenly struck with how stupid he is being. These guys are clearly Pandora’s friends. They are here for her. They don’t care about Regulus himself, they’re here to study and see Pandora. Even if James is staring at him and trying to make conversation, that’s fine because James hasn’t spoken to Regulus in years and as far as Regulus is concerned, there is no need to start now.

"I think that’s enough for tonight," Regulus says, lying through his teeth and attempting to smile innocently at the lions at the table, though he knows it's more likely to look like a grimace.

James jolts next to him, "Wait—"

Regulus cuts James off by standing up, practically scooping his books and parchment into a pile. "I have to be up early tomorrow for ancient runes tomorrow, so I’m going to head to bed."

Regulus is most certainly not going to bed. He still has far too much outstanding homework to finish and hasn’t done enough studying today to earn his reading time. He’ll go back to the common room and continue, and if it’s not quiet enough in there, he’ll close the curtains around his bed in the dorm and continue there.

"Night, Regulus," Pandora says, but Regulus has already gathered his books into his arms and is out the library before anyone can even attempt to stop him.

Regulus manages to snag a few hours of peace in the common room to finish his homework that night. He moves to his dorm room when people started coming in to go to bed, and even then, because he’d finished his assignments, he allows himself to close the drapes around his bed and open his book for some evening reading.

He went to bed late, getting too wrapped up in dragons and working on translating the latin inscribing about extinct species, and the next morning is surprised to not feel groggy after the lack of healthy sleep.

In the morning, Pandora finds him in their first class. Regulus didn’t go to breakfast, but instead to the library to see if there were any books on arithmancy that he hasn’t read yet (there was not).

Regulus arrived early to ancient runes, so by the time Pandora comes skipping in, he’s already been sat at the desk for 10 minutes. Regulus hates being late as much as he hates his heritage. The whole concept makes his skin crawl.

"You didn’t have to leave last night," she says as she sits down beside him. "James didn’t stay long, Remus dragged him off after a while because he wouldn’t stop talking."

"They’re your friends," Regulus argues, not looking up from finding his page in his textbook to see if he should add any last touches to his runes essay.

"You’re my friend," Pandora argues back, and that has Regulus looking up.

He knows he’s Pandora’s friend, and she knows she’s his best friend. It’s not her fault she attached herself to the most unsociable creature to walk the corridors of Hogwarts on the train that first day. She’s managed to expand her social circle enough through the years despite Regulus unintentionally holding her back. Pandora has no shame in going off on her own with other people, and Regulus doesn’t mind. He wants Pandora to have other friends too. She deserves them, and people love Pandora.

Regulus just isn’t the same.

"I know," Regulus finally replies. "I just. . ."

"Don’t want to talk to them?" Pandora smiles.

"It’s not them personally—"

"You know I don’t expect you to become friends with them, Reg," she eases. "I just don’t want you to feel uncomfortable. I’ve gotten quite close to Lily and Dorcas, but you’re my best friend. You know that."

"I know," Regulus says quietly. "You don’t have to choose—"

"Besides," she smirks suddenly, "despite it being entirely unplanned that they turned up, I thought you wouldn’t mind James being there too much."

Regulus frowns.

"What’s that supposed to mean?"

Pandora flashes him a look that clearly speaks are you going to make me say it?

Regulus most certainly does not want Pandora to say it.

Despite his pitiful crush, Regulus has been quite sure he’s managed to keep it private and secret for long enough. He shouldn’t be surprised Pandora has caught on. She seems to know more about Regulus than he knows himself, but if Pandora has caught on, then who else has?

Has it become too obvious?

Regulus doesn’t get a chance to ask, even if he wanted to, because seconds later, the rest of the class is filing in and the door is shutting behind the professor.

Later, at dinner, Regulus has just finished his dinner when he exits the hall. He’s hoping to get a few more hours in the library tonight going over and rewriting his class notes from the ancient runes work they did in the morning class. Almost all the students are still in the hall, eating and chatting, so he feels like he can safely believe that the library will be quiet and he won’t be disturbed like the night before.

Regulus barely manages to get five steps away from the hall doors before he’s narrowly avoiding bumping into someone.

"Hey, Reg!" James smiles. His eyes flicker to the Great Hall doors, then back to Regulus. "Have you already eaten?"

"I, uh, yes," Regulus stammers. He refrains from the urge to look down at his shoes, despite how much he wants to.

"Oh," James nods. "I’m running late because I had to speak to Minnie after class. I really hope Peter managed to save me some of the bread rolls."

"Right," Regulus sighs. What is this boys problem to sudden want to speak to Regulus? They’ve got years being perfectly content barely in each others lives, the only thing connecting them was Sirius. Why has James suddenly remembered Regulus exists?

James is looking at him. The smile is still there, blinding and bright. It truly is a world-star smile. Regulus can’t imagine anyone ever looking at James and thinking he was unattractive. Even with his huge glasses, frames thin and round like he’s stepped off the stage of a Beatles concert, suit him like the warm chocolate brown of his eyes suit the caramel silk of his skin.

Stop it, Regulus tells himself. They’re in the middle of the corridor. Students are around and Regulus has allowed himself to start gawking over James’ stupid looks.

He might as well start drooling all over himself.

Nothing could be as embarrassing as this encounter.

"Excuse me," Regulus murmurs, beginning to side step but James holds his hands up.

"Wait! I, um," James lets out a stuttering breath, suddenly appearing as flustered as Regulus feels. "I want to apologise."

Regulus narrows his eyes. "Apologise? For what?"

"For last night," James says. "You know, in the library. I didn’t— you didn’t have to leave, especially because of me. You should have told me to buggar off if I was annoying you, really."

"Oh," Regulus blinks. "I. . . it was fine. I didn’t—"

"I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable."

"You didn’t," Regulus lies, but only because he doesn’t want to upset James. He might be hating every moment of this interaction, and James was a large player in the cause of Regulus’ flee last night, but the the older boy doesn’t need to know that.

James looks sad. That was exactly what Regulus is trying to avoid, but the urge to get away from this conversation wins out over being nice.

Without another word, Regulus steps around James and makes his way down the corridor. James shouts him a goodbye, but Regulus doesn’t reply.

The same continues all week. Regulus’ study sessions in the library, which are normally only crashed by Pandora, has suddenly become a social event for a handful of Gryffindors that despite how many times Regulus ignores them, don’t seem to understand that they’re invading a space they weren’t invited to.

By the weekend, Regulus feels both highly strung and utterly exhausted. He’s had to talk to more people in the last seven days than he has the whole last five years he’s been at Hogwarts.

When Friday rolls around, Regulus can’t bring himself to even risk a full library table of chatty students, so he grabs a quick dinner in the Great Hall and doesn’t hesitate to excuse himself before anyone might get the idea to talk to him any further.

He goes to the Ravenclaw common room, barely managing a nod to the seventh years sitting on the sofa’s before he’s dashing up to his dorm room. He grabs his books, parchment and crackers from his trunk before climbing onto his bed and spelling the curtains closed. He puts up a silencing charm and a charm to keep the curtains closed so he has no risk of interruptions.

He doesn’t leave his dorm until Monday morning. The detachment from the Hogwarts cohort is refreshing. He gets all of his assignments done, proofread and even touched up twice. He goes over the content they’ve learned, has all of his class notes more neatly written out. He even has enough time by the end of the weekend to spend the majority of Sunday just laying down and reading.

No one in the dorm bothered him. After living together in the same room for five years, his Ravenclaw room mates have becomes quite accustomed to Regulus’ bizarre life habits and strive for quietness. To anyone else, being holed up in bed for two whole days without moving aside from going to the bathroom would be highly concerning, but they know Regulus. They’ve probably been waiting for the days of hibernation, though it’s not often he feels the need to do it so early on in the year.

When Regulus resurfaces back into the land of the living on Monday morning, he feels he’s had a productive weekend. Sure, he’s quite dizzy from the lack of proper food and tired from the slightly rough sleep schedule he’s put himself in, but he feels more able to cope with the life that continues to fly past him.

His first lesson is potions with the Gryffindors, and he stays behind to talk to Slughon about the reason why magical potions can’t be used in tablet form like in the muggle medicine world.

He has a free period after his first lesson, so naturally, Regulus makes his way to the library. When he gets there, his table is empty. He is gifted approximately four and a half minutes of peace before three chairs are being pulled from the table.

Lily, Lupin and Mary take seats around him as if he was one of their own they were simply meeting for a study session. Pandora stands beside him, looking down at him with her eyebrows pinched and lips in a thin line.

Regulus immediately starts to wonder what he’s done.

"Morning, Regulus," Lily smiles. Regulus really wishes she was nasty and unkind, because it’s hard to hate someone who genuinely doesn’t seem to have a prejudice bone in their body.

"Morning," he murmurs back, pointedly looking back down at parchment of notes he’s rewriting. He wishes he could do natural clear writing during class, but he has to write notes so fast anything he produces in lessons are a fumbled, chaotic mess. Hence, the frequent task of rewriting them.

"You’ve been avoiding me," Pandora says above him.

"No I haven’t," Regulus argues, and it’s technically true: he wasn’t avoiding her, as such. In fact, if anything, he was avoiding everyone and taking some well-earned and desperately overdue time to himself over the weekend to catch up on the work he’d been repeatedly disrupted with throughout the week. He just wanted, and needed, a few days to himself.

Pandora should know this. It certainly isn’t the first time he’s done it.

"You have," she replies, and as quickly as the glare took hold on her face, it melts away and softens. Suddenly, she looks concerned. She reaches out and gently strokes her finger across his cheek. "You’ve not been eating either."

"I ate in my dorm."

She scoffs. "You haven’t been eating then. You look like shit, Reg."

"I just slept badly last night," Regulus says, and again: not a total lie. A twist of the truth, he likes to argue. "I’m still not used to how cold Scotland is."

"It’s September, Regulus," she says dryly, clearly not believing him. "It’s not cold at all, even for you."

Regulus can feel all four sets of eyes on him. He’s starting to get annoyed at her for making a scene at the table. Really, he hasn’t done anything wrong. He was eating over the weekend, he got through enough crackers and water to keep his brain focused on the task. He looks peaky because he’s fighting between the urge to throw up with nerves over the table or flee from the library like he’s being chased by a dragon breathing fire.

"Come on. We’re going to the kitchens," Pandora says, not even waiting for Regulus to say anything before she’s pulling his books back into his bag.

"Wait, I—"

"No objections!" She interrupts. "You can come back and rewrite your notes when you no longer look like you’re going to keel over in a soft wind."

Regulus opens his mouth to object again, but quickly closes it with a soft, audible click. There’s no point arguing with Pandora. He should at least be grateful she’s taking him to the kitchens and not dragging him to the lunch hall for everyone to witness her mother-henning.

Regulus doesn’t look at the Gryffindor’s when Pandora exchanges goodbyes with them. Instead, he keeps his head down and walks with her out of the library.

Regulus goes to the kitchen far more often than Pandora. She doesn’t mind the Great Hall, but Regulus found it hard during his first years at Hogwarts when the occupants of the Slytherin table were always glaring at him for not going to their house like a 'true Black should'. They started to let up after a while, but then Regulus had started to enjoy sometimes having the peace of going to the kitchens instead of the inner battle of dealing with the busy and loud Great Hall during meal times.

Regulus enjoys the company of the house elves too. He’s missed Kreacher since moving out of Grimmauld Place, and the elves in the kitchen are a decent replacement when he’s missing his small friend or worrying about how he’s being treated without Regulus there.

The elves make them far too much food, but neither Regulus or Pandora have the heart to tell them that. They tuck in while Regulus listens to Pandora give him her usual you need to look after yourself better speech.

Regulus has lost count of how many times he’s heard it.

It’s all good intentions though. Regulus has gotten used to Pandora watching over him, making sure he’s eating properly and getting the right nutrients and minerals in his pretty minuscule diet. Regulus knows the issues stem from years of food being used as punishment growing up. Regulus has just gotten used to going without, and if he has to choose between a meal and time to read, study, or simply be alone, he will also choose food second.

Pandora caught onto that quite quick, and has taken it upon herself since to make sure Regulus ate properly. Or at least, as properly as she can make him.

She starts to tell him about her weekend after the familiar scolding is finished.

Regulus is listening, humming and nodding when it’s appropriate. It sounds like she had a pretty decent weekend. A trip to Hogsmeade, lunch in the pub, prefect rounds with a Slytherin who thankfully isn’t a piece of work that’s going to make her life hard.

Suddenly, Regulus notices her face becoming flushed.

"You okay?"

She nods, but she looks like she’s barely holding in shouting something.

"What’s wrong?" Regulus asks again, because he knows the signs of Pandora needing to talk about something important.

"I’m still sorry for inviting people to our study table in the library," she admits.

"Oh," Regulus blinks. He looks down at his half eaten food, and uses his fork to gently nudge the potato back and forth for a few moments. "I already said it was fine."

"I know. I know you’re lying too. Which is why I’m still sorry," she says.

He nods. "It’s fine, Dora. You have lots of friends, you’re allowed to see them whenever you want. It’s not my table."

"But it makes you miserable."

"No it doesn’t," he shakes his head, flashing her a small smile. "I leave before it does."

"And that’s why you still had to spend the entire weekend avoiding people?"

"I just needed some quiet for a little while."

"I can stop inviting them," she offers.

"Don’t do that," he shakes his head, despite how lovely that sounds. He misses his quiet revision corner in the library, but there is clearly a reason why Pandora is going on about this. Something is clearly bothering her. "You want them there, you—"

"It’s not all of them," she suddenly blurts.

Regulus frowns. "What?"

"I want Lily there," she admits, her cheeks red like she’s put her face to a stove. "That’s why I had to invite them all. I didn’t want her to think I was inviting her personally."

"Why would it have been a problem if you only invited her?"

"Because we barely know each other."

Regulus is even more confused now. "Pandora, you’ve known her for years."

Pandora sighs, shaking her head. "I don’t—. . . I like her, Reg."

"Oh," Regulus blinks. "Oh."

"Yeah," she scoffs. "Oh. That’s why I. . . why I invited her to the table. But I got all flustered, and I didn’t want to make it weird, so I invited everyone else too."

"Okay."

"It’s not okay," she shakes her head. She really looks like she’s beating herself up over it. "I’m sorry."

"You don’t have a reason to be sorry."

"They make you uncomfortable," she states.

Very much so, yes.

"Technically, everyone makes me uncomfortable," Regulus shrugs.

The Gryffindors do make Regulus uncomfortable, but it’s nothing they do personally. Yes, it’s weird to be studying with his older brothers boyfriend whom Regulus has barely ever had a conversation with, but Lupin isn’t a bad person. He’s quiet too, which Regulus appreciates. He doesn’t try to make Regulus talk, and he murmurs quietly when he speaks to the other girls, and even then he doesn’t talk for long. Lupin seems to go to the library for the same thing that Regulus does: to study. Lily is fine, a bit too bubbly and smiley and chatty for Regulus, but he just leaves when it gets too much. Regulus can’t decide about Marlene and Dorcas. They’re not bad, but they’re certainly the louder of the four, and Regulus often catches them both staring at him as if they’re waiting for him to combust at the table.

It’s not really fine. Pandora respected Regulus’ desire to be private and keep a small, quiet life enough to not mention him to people on her social escapades, but not enough to deny people invading their shared space in the library.

Pandora doesn’t do a lot for herself though. She’s tough enough to not let anyone walk over her, but she’s too kind and generous for her own good. She doesn’t do a lot of things with her own benefit in mind, so for her to be desperate enough to invite Lily to their secret study sessions, Regulus figures this is a little more than a small, girl crush. 

"It’s fine," he repeats.

It’s not, but he can pretend for her.

— tbc.