Barty Crouch has felt his heart stop twice in his life – once momentarily, and once forever.
The First:
Evan Rosier was flawed.
He had scars under his belly that cut deep and never healed. His blonde hair was always dirty, littered with specks of paint and grass, even when it still smelled fresh from a shower. He put on nice fake smiles and rarely did it truthfully but when he did, it was wicked. Mischievous and bright. He was always warm, never in a bloody sweater, arms and collarbone constantly on display as if the world had asked – which it most definitely did not. His laugh was fucking contagious, always stuck in other’s brains and persistently annoyed those who dared to listen. Every part of him was unnerving and frustrating and so damningly infuriating.
Especially his stupid eyes.
Yes, Evan Rosier was flawed and Barty hated him for it.
Hated the way he wanted to kiss the scars and tell Evan it made him human. Hated the way he wanted to run his hand through the pale hair and remove any impurities that dare touch him. Hated the way he wanted to see those genuine smiles all the time and how much he wanted to slap him when the false ones surfaced. Hated the way he was always distracted during Potions, eyes running over Evan and committing to memory whatever he was allowed. Hated the way a smile would always sneak up on him when he heard the other boy laugh, denying Barty of any sadness that he originally planned to wallow in. Hated how every part of him was unnerving and frustrating and so damningly perfect.
Hated his bloody blue eyes.
So, it was exceedingly annoying when Barty was awakened by thunder one dreadful night, shivering from the memory that he relived in his dream.
He shot up on his bed, back drenched with sweat even in his singlet but skin prickling from the freezing cold. He sighs, trying his hardest to quiet the panting, and tosses the blanket off of him. Quietly, Barty moves across the dorm, sifting through the basket of clothes to find a clean sweater. He pulls of the sweaty shirt and replaces it with the sweater that he isn’t sure belongs to who. With soft steps, he pads back towards his bed before hearing the devil’s voice float into the air, tempting him.
“Barty?” it says.
The voice was soft and unsure, but familiar in ways he didn’t want to admit.
“Go back to sleep, Evan,” he sighs. There was no response. His own voice sounded strangled and laced with echoes of pure exhaustion that had become a product of his recent troubles. The silence in the dorm was suffocating, poking Barty as he lay awake, staring at the ceiling.
After a few minutes, the voice came again. “Still awake?”
Barty hums in response, too tired to even move his mouth.
“Come here,” Evan says simply as if it were the most normal thing in the world.
Now under any normal circumstances, Barty would have scoffed, rolled over, and squeezed his eyes shut until he fell back to sleep. But tonight, he was tired, mind fuzzy, and he was still shivering despite the extra thick sweater that he now realises, in a shock, is Evan’s. His chest squeezes too, aching for his best friend, which in retrospect Barty supposes is not normal.
But tonight, he deserves to not care.
At least that’s what he tells himself as he drags himself out of bed and pushes Evan’s curtains aside.
The other boy is sitting up, hair dishevelled and face so soft it makes Barty want to scream and cry and throw Evan out of the window just so he can save him later and kiss all the injuries better.
Yeah, he’s fucked.
Barty chuckles as he spots a glint of dried black paint on the tip of Evan’s hair, contrasting perfectly against the pale blonde. He reaches over and plucks it out easily, playing with the debris between his fingers. Evan shuffles over on his bed, making space for Barty as he gratefully plops down next to him.
They both sit cross-legged, facing each other, Barty’s eyes trained on the piece of black paint that he rolls around in his hand. “What did you paint today?”
Evan eyes him criticizingly, knowing he was trying to avoid the “what’s wrong?” talk. But he plays into it which Barty silently thanks him for.
“Uhm, you.”
Involuntarily, and he emphasises on this, Barty smiles. Unable to stop himself, he asks. “Why?”
Evan doesn’t seem to think before answering simply, “Because you deserve to be immortalised.”
Barty stops breathing, unsure of how to respond.
“Plus, you’re pretty.”
“Yeah?” Barty asks.
Evan laughs quietly. “Yeah.”
Barty flicks the speck of paint toward Evan, watching as it doesn’t quite reach, and lands comfortably between them.
Very often, Barty feels quite like that. So close to his best friend, flying toward him like it was where he was destined to go, yet never being able to touch him like he wants to. Falling flat before he even reached his destination.
“Why can’t you sleep?”
“Should be asking you that.”
Evan’s lips turn up in a fond smile before nodding in agreement. “Okay then, truce?”
“Truce.”
Evan shifts himself, plonking his head on the pillow and rests one arm behind his head. “Come on then, lie down.”
Barty lets his body move for him, mind too tired to consciously tell what is appropriate and what wasn’t. He lets his head rest on Evan’s chest, arms pooling around his waist and legs tangling together. He squeezes gently and sighs contentedly. He feels Evan’s free arm coming around to wrap his shoulders and they both, somehow if possible, sink closer into one another.
Barty is unable to stop his eyes from drooping almost instantly, body at rest and impossibly warm in Evan’s arms. He could fall asleep quite quickly like this.
“Tell me something stupid,” Evan says suddenly.
“Hm,” Barty hums tiredly. “You’re pretty too.”
“The prettiest?”
Barty chuckles. “After me? Of course.”
Evan hums quietly, taking in his answer. “I agree.”
And Barty doesn’t know what to do with that at all. He wants to ask, so badly, so he does. “What about you?”
“What do you mean?”
“Tell me something stupid,” he whispers, his voice drops as if it was a big secret though Barty isn’t fully sure why. Maybe it’s because that is exactly what his feelings for Evan are like. Something private that only exists under the moon, in the dark – something that cannot, under any circumstances, be revisited in daylight.
Evan brings the arm behind his head down, tucking a falling strand of Barty’s dark hair behind his ear. He immediately pushes into the touch without thinking, wishing furiously for more but taking whatever little crumbs Evan would give him.
“I think,” Evan begins, voice only slightly above a whisper. “I think I’m falling in love with you.”
Barty feels his heart stop then. For a split second, he is sure that he is medically dead. Words don’t find him, his aching chest calming for one moment, and he swears he sees heaven.
It’s those bloody words that he has wanted to hear for 5 years now. 5 long, painful years that he has spent whispering those words to Evan when he knows he can’t hear them. Saying it inwardly when he watches him laugh or do something so Evan-like that he feels the love surging up and taking over him. Pressing it to Evan’s body silently every time they hug or their shoulders brush, waiting and wanting so much for him to know. To reciprocate. To hear.
But now, when Evan is ready to, the words fail him.
“Barty? I’m sorry I don’t know why- I uhm- I shouldn’t have said that.”
“Don’t,” Barty demands. His voice shaky and his breaths careless. “Please, don’t take it back.”
“Oh.”
They are silent for a moment, a moment that feels like hours. Barty wants to hold on to this for centuries, wants it to drag out forever, he could never get bored of this elation. Barty wants it to last, to be perfect, fears opening his mouth to ruin something so good like he always does.
When the heart that Evan just stopped beats again, it beats faster and more alive. It beats for Evan. It always will.
“I don’t think that’s stupid,” he says finally in a quiet breath.
“No?”
“No.”
“Do you, uhm-,” he begins, the sentence never fully formed as Barty cuts him off.
"Like you have no idea."
Evan’s voice drops below a whisper, so soft that if he wasn’t desperately listening for it, Barty’s sure he would’ve missed it. “Tell me.”
Stupidly, and he blames his god damn exhausted mind for this, Barty responds truthfully.
“I love you like a weightless wish.”
Evan breathes in sharply. “Weightless?”
“Like flight. It is impossibly large.”
“Wish?” he asks, the fear in his voice evident, cracking slightly.
“So impossibly large that it might just be that - impossible.”
“Impossible,” he breathes.
“Tragically so.”
Barty traces a B onto Evan’s torso, followed by an R. He carves the small and fleeting existence of them ever ending up together onto his body, hoping and praying and dreaming.
‘Please, if there is one thing you let me have Lord, let it be him.’
Life, it turns it however, is quite miserable.
“I still love you despite it,” Evan adds after a few seconds.
“I know,” Barty says softly. “So do I.”
“Say you love me.”
“I love you.”
He feels a wet tear drop on his hair and a smile curve against his head. His heart aches again, he doesn’t want Evan to cry. He doesn’t want him to hurt.
Only then does he realise his own tears sliding down his cheeks, staining Evan’s blue shirt.
“I love you,” Evan says finally, words soft and tangled in the air. Tossed to a land where dreams may have come true.
And that, Barty concludes in his mind, is Evan’s biggest, most fatal flaw. Loving someone as foolish as himself.
Yes, Evan Rosier was flawed and Barty loved him irrevocably because of it.
------
The Second:
They will tell you that Rosier was captured with Wilkes. What they tell you, is wrong.
They will also tell you his death was at the hands of Alastor Moody, and whilst this is true, the auror is not to blame. Evan Rosier’s death was the fault of one person and one person only: Barty Crouch.
Firstly, it was not Wilkes that Evan was caught with, it was Alice Longbottom. Though, they would never tell you that. They couldn’t. A member of Dumbledore’s precious order associating with a known Death Eater? Unheard of.
But it’s the truth.
It was the summer of 1981, merely a few months before the Dark Lord’s downfall, and Barty had received a letter from the Longbottoms. He had tossed it up without reading it, laughed, and thrown it at the head of a clueless Evan who was calmly sipping his tea.
“Bartemius Crouch.”
“Father?” Barty says with a dramatic gasp, looking back with an exaggerated turn as he jokes. “By golly! I haven’t seen you in ages!”
Evan laughs and it flies and flies and flies right into Barty’s chest, settling behind his ribs like it was made to be there.
“You are impossible.”
“You love it,” he says playfully before immediately regretting it. They were grown now, no longer stupid teenagers, and since that fateful night where Barty was sure he had died, the word ‘love’ was no longer carelessly thrown about. In fact, it was never about at all.
“I do,” Evan says softly, perhaps hoping that Barty wouldn’t hear it, but he does and oh.
Oh, oh, oh.
Evan bends to pick up the crumpled piece of paper, eyes glancing over the words.
“They had a baby.”
“A baby? During this mess?”
“Well,” Evan grins. “Some people just can’t help it.”
Barty smirks at him. “Are you some people?”
“Might be,” Evan shrugs, a playful smile gracing his lips.
They do this, they flirt, they always have. They tease and they touch and sometimes they love silently and powerfully but never, never do they allow themselves to do more. They never kiss, they never confess, and they never ever let themselves believe.
That is a luxury even a Rosier and Crouch are unwelcome to.
“Why’d they send us a letter?”
“Might’ve been one of those broadcast things and we just still happened to be on their list from Hogwarts.”
“Idiots,” Barty chuckles.
Evan stays silent, rereading the short letter.
“What if-”
“No.”
“But Barty-”
“It’s too dangerous.”
“But they’re friends.”
“They’re not,” he says firmly. “They haven’t been for years.”
“But they were,” Evan says sadly.
And Barty understands the feeling all too well. He had been friends with several people who he had to sacrifice for the Death Eaters. He hadn’t meant to join originally, but when Evan and Regulus were forced into it, there was no other path for him. There was no other path for Barty that wasn’t beside Evan.
He misses Dorcas the most. He thinks if it would’ve been Dorcas asking, he would have gone. But unfortunately, she was dead.
Just like many others, her beautiful curls and her dark brown eyes and her tan skin were lost forever to the ground. But she fought, and Barty is proud of her, and he apologises everyday that he didn’t stop it when he could have.
But Alice and Frank Longbottoms were not special to him.
“Honestly, I don’t remember talking to them more than 3 times Evs.”
Evan folds the crumpled paper neatly and delicately in four, placing it gently next to his tea before taking another sip.
“Alice taught me quidditch.”
“And for that you would risk your life?”
“Barty,” he whines. Barty raises an eyebrow in question, wondering why this was so important to Evan. It’s not like they haven’t gotten other letters before. They received one from the Potters’. They showed up secretly to that one, under an invisibility charm, leaving quickly without anyone knowing. Reg would have wanted that.
They also received letters from multiple other families they had gone to school with, none of which they paid anymore attention to other than laughing at the ridiculous names they had picked out.
“Alice was there for me when nobody else was.”
“What?” Barty exclaims, his voice raising at least 3 octaves. “When?”
“In uhm, in first year.”
“I was there in first year!” he says, completely confused. “Reg too!”
“No but-,” Evan says, voice hesitating. “Do I have to tell you, can’t you just, you know, accept it.”
“Evan, this is your life we’re talking about.”
“Don’t be so dramatic, Alice wouldn’t kill me.”
“I just want to know what you mean, sweetheart,” the pet name slips out and Barty recoils slightly when he sees Evan flinch. He hasn’t called him that in years, not after Hogwarts that’s for sure.
“She was the first person who made me feel okay about, well, about you.”
Barty is taken aback slightly, trying to piece his words together in confusion before realising, “Oh.”
“Yeah.”
“You told her?”
“That I was gay?” Evan questions and Barty nods calmly, trying to hide the fact that he did not know that at all. He knew Evan loved him but Barty never really put together the fact that he was gay. For Barty, he doesn’t think he’s gay. He doesn’t think he’s anything really. He doesn’t find many people attractive. But Evan? Evan was the exception.
“No, I didn’t,” Evan said after some time. “But uh, she told me, about someone she loved that made me realise I wasn’t the only fucked up one.”
“You’re not fucked up at all, Evan.”
Barty says it softly and carefully as if trying to worm the words into Evan’s ear and bury it under his brain.
“Please, Barty, just this one time.”
“But what if-,” he says, still scared for Evan’s life.
“Come with me then,” Evan says. “We won’t go to the party, we’ll ask to meet her in the woods, she’ll say yes, I know she will. And you can hide behind a tree and you won’t come out and if anyone comes to take me, you’ll protect me.”
Barty thinks over it carefully. It could work.
“I trust you,” Evan says and how can Barty ever say no after that?
“Okay,” he sighs. Evan jumps out of his chair and hugs Barty, squeezing him. Once again, his chest clenches around his heart, not stopping it, but nearly. He clings onto Evan, burying his nose into his hair.
“But this is a bad idea,” Barty says into his ears.
“When have we ever had a good one?” Evan says gleefully, letting go of him after some time.
“Touché.”
Evan walks back to the table and dunks the rest of his tea before walking over to the sink and washing it.
“Evs?”
“B?”
“Is that why you don’t love me anymore,” Barty says quietly. He’d been thinking it for a while now. Evan had stopped leaving lingering touches and his voice doesn’t go soft like it used to. The smile reserved especially for Barty hasn’t seen the light of day in ages and the words they share are no longer filled with desperate desire.
“What?” Evan says sharply, swinging around and almost dropping the cup he was holding.
“You know, because Alice married Frank, so maybe yeah, we are a bit fucked up.”
Evan’s mouth falls open in shock. He stalks towards Barty with determination, cup forgotten on the counter, hands gripping his cheeks roughly and pulling his face down to look at him. “I never fucking stopped you idiot.”
“You love me?”
Evan pulls Barty down further to kiss his forehead, pressing it deep into his skin and etching it onto his flesh. “More so, every day.”
Barty’s hands settle at Evan’s waist and remain there. They part after a while, Evan saying that he needs to go find something to wear and Barty grinning, telling him to wear nothing. Evan laughs and skips off, leaving him with words that made him slightly lighter.
But Barty doesn’t forget the way it was Evan who had broken them apart first and that he didn’t quite say the three words he claimed to mean.
The woods was especially dark, leaving the pair shrouded below covered leaves.
Barty was behind a tree, Evan was talking lightly with the enemy. It all seemed too normal.
I trust you.
“Aw, Baby Neville, was it?”
“Yeah,” Alice says softly like she couldn’t help but be stupidly soft when looking at the bundle in her arms.
“He’s beautiful.”
Alice nods in agreement. Barty watches carefully, something in his stomach stirring in warning.
I trust you.
“How’s Narcissa?” Alice asks hesitantly.
Evan smiles to himself. “You know, I was wondering when you were going to get around to asking.”
Alice gives him a small laugh. It clicks in Barty’s mind. Narcissa Black. Of course.
“She’s okay.”
“Yeah?”
“Okay as one can be under our circumstances, I guess.”
“Yeah.”
Evan looks up at her curiously. “Speaking of, why did you say yes to this, I could kill you right now.”
Barty almost slaps his forehead at his idiocy. Leave it up to Evan to provoke the sleeping beast. Still though, Barty’s eyes do not move from them.
I trust you.
The glint in Alice’s eyes darken in worry but the soft smile doesn’t leave her face. “Let’s call it a homage to what used to be.”
And Barty knew immediately that something was very, very wrong. The lightness in her voice had dissipated, replaced by something similar to guilt and viciousness.
I trust you.
Evan must have heard it too, backing away slightly from the older girl. The baby in Alice’s arms dissolved into fine dust, sprinkling over her shoes and clothes.
I trust you.
“I’m so sorry Evan,” Alice says, her voice trembling.
I trust you.
Barty grabs at his wand but Moody is faster.
You deserve to be immortalised.
“Avada Kedavra!”
Tell me something stupid.
It misses Evan only slightly, scratching the tree that Barty hides behind.
I think,
Barty jumps out, his mask on securely and his wand at his side.
“Stupefy!” he aims at Moody, tossing Evan his wand.
I think I’m falling in love with you.
It misses and hits Alice.
Falling in love
Evan trips when running away, falling onto his knees as Barty rushes to cover for him.
With you.
“Incendio!” Moody shouts. Barty dodges.
I still love you despite it.
“Run B,” Evan says, fully realising his predicament.
Tell me you love me.
“Not leaving you,” Barty says in a huff. “Never leaving you.”
I love you.
Alastor casts something that Barty can’t make out, the sound muffled by Evan tackling him away from the stream of light.
I trust you.
The spell hits Evan square on the chest.
Barty hears a pop and knows Moody has taken Alice away.
I love you.
“Evan?”
Barty climbs over him, looking into eyes that seem dazed and unfocused.
“Barty, hey, hi,” he says, bleeding onto the grass.
“Evan,” Barty says again, the words coming out as a breath. Wordless.
“Love, hey, look at me.”
“Please.”
“Tell me something stupid.”
A sob wrecks through Barty then, feeling Evan reaching up to wipe a tear off his face.
“I love you, oh my god I love you so much.”
“Tragically so?” Evan asks, smiling despite the circumstances. Barty doesn’t answer, he can’t. He clutches Evan harder, threatening to squeeze him into nothing.
“Do me something Barty.”
“Anything.”
“Don’t kiss me.”
“What?”
“Don’t kiss me now, I’ll leave the world wishing for a thousand more. And don’t kiss me when I’ve died, I couldn’t bear it if my body knew your touch but I did not.”
“Evan you won’t die.”
“Your optimism shocks me.”
“Shut up, please, please don’t die.”
“I’m afraid I don’t have a choice, love.”
Barty runs his hand through Evan’s hair, picking out the grass that has fallen onto it. He traces his face and presses on the dimples in his cheeks. He looks at his eyes. Those bloody blue eyes that mesmerised the small 11-year-old Bartemius Crouch who had no idea what he was doing. The eyes that screamed home, safety, warmth. Love.
“Barty?”
“Here, here, always here.”
“Listen to me carefully, and for once please believe me,” Evan pleads. Barty looks at him and nods. “I love you. I have never loved anyone the way I love you. Actually, I’ve never loved anyone but you. You’re it for me Barty.”
“How am I not supposed to kiss you after that?” he whines.
And despite it all, Evan laughs through the tears. And Barty remembers it well, so sweetly, so perfectly. The most beautiful sound god ever created. “You’re impossible.”
Barty tries to smile softly at him but it comes out as a weep. “Tell me something stupid.”
Evan reaches out to tuck Barty’s hair behind his ear, staining it with blood. “I’ve always loved the impossible.”
Barty falls onto Evan, hugging him tightly and letting himself be hugged. They stay like that, Barty’s head on Evan’s chest, feeling his heart slow and allowing Evan’s blood to stain every bit of him. Faces buried away, forgotten promises never fulfilled, endings never completed.
Evan whispers “I love you” into his hair over and over again, Barty responding each time, breathing it into his neck.
It’s unclear who said it last.
All Barty knows is that when Evan’s heart stopped, Barty’s did with it.
And this time, it had no one to beat for again.
After that day, Bartemius Crouch Jr. went medically insane. Crazy, lost, and mad, he vowed revenge on anyone who had dared strip the world of the wonder that was Evan Rosier.
Alastor Moody, Alice Longbottom, Frank Longbottom, Bartemius Crouch Jr.
No lord could save those that had taken happiness away from him for no lord had let him keep his love.
And when the dementors came to suck out his soul, he did not bother to tell them it was fine, that it was his plan all along.
For there was no soul to suck out, no heart to destroy. He had left every part of him with the bleeding boy in the woods.
I trust you.
Do you still?
Barty Crouch no longer existed.
He did not matter.
Do you love me?
I’ve no heart to love with.
He was nothing without Evan, a shell of insanities that were left homeless in a world that split the evil and good.
A war raged in his head and no one could stop it.
It’s Barty’s fault, it’s their fault.
It doesn’t matter whose fault.
Evan Rosier is dead.
I still love you despite it.
What a foolish thing to do.
And flowers didn’t quite bloom the same again.
I love you.
I do too.