Busy busy busy
“Don’t forget,” Emma leans forwards as the class ends. “Quidditch tryouts are next week, I expect you both to be there.” She says to Dorcas and Regulus.
“Don’t understand how you can call me violent when you play that game..” Barty mumbled as they all started to pack up.
“What was the first thing you did walking into class? Oh yes,” He was already rolling his eyes. “Threaten to bite someone.” Dorcas raised her eyebrow as they continued to bicker. Regulus stood, looking up he made eye contact with a Gryffindor. He saw the green goo on the side of his head and his nose scrunched. He saw as a timid hand came up to wave and he rolled his eyes.
“You coming to the library?” Regulus turned to Barty, interrupting his friend's feud.
Barty stood up and turned to Dorcas, “Pretend to bite me and I will charm your tongue to be dry the rest of the day.”
He stood back, “Pretend? So you’re saying you want me to properly bite you-”
“Barty-”
“Only if I get to choose where.” His proud grin disappeared as Dorcas took out her wand. “Let’s go the library!” With his arm hooked in Regulus’s he ran out the class, dragging his friend with him.
Their banter, while usually amusing, wasn’t distraction enough for what was going through his mind. The Slytherins' constant reminder of what he wished he could forget, his friend’s grave and then his brother. Hit the whole trifecta in one day and it wasn’t even lunch yet.
“Why we going the library again?”
“To read.. Books? You see Libraries, they have shelves of them.”
“Ha ha. We don’t have anything to read yet.”
“There’s always something to read, didn’t you and Pandora get those books you wanted yesterday.” He sighed.
Barty gave him a dirty look, “We could only get one of each, she called dibs.”
“I didn’t know all it took to persuade you was, dibs. I call dibs on alone time.” He in return, gets an elbow to the ribs, the dibs did not work. They finally made it to the library though.
“Right, so while you do you-” Regulus picks out a book on dark magic and one that he brought from Grimmauld place. “I need a brick wall to talk to and you ignore me in similar ways.”
Regulus shook his head while opening the book, “Yes- exactly like that.”
It was strange or should have been, he was looking for text on how to destroy a horcrux so he could avenge his friend, protect his others. And Barty sat across from him, ranting about girls and his winter, it was probably the only reason he didn’t break down in the library right there.
Barty eventually left and he was three books deep in research after another class.
“People usually take a break at lunch.”
Regulus looked up at the unfamiliar voice and suppressed an annoyed eye roll. “Lupin.”
“Hi baby Black,”
“Don’t call me that.”
“You gonna be Slytherin prefect this year?”
Regulus stops, “Prefect?” Quidditch trials, horcrux destroying, robbery, a bank heist and then prefect duties? Busy busy year ahead. “No.”
“Why not?” He takes a seat opposite him without invitation.
“Not your concern, find someone else.”
“See- that’s so much effort, it’d just be easier if you said yes.” Lupin shrugged, the only reason he was listening was his Welsh accent that stood out. “Three rounds a week, none on weekends, one meeting on Monday.”
“I have Quidditch. Not to mention O.W.L’s next year.” Which he might not even be doing. “If you want someone, ask Evan Rosier.”
“Your friend?” He said with an unimpressed raised eyebrow.
Regulus managed a smile, “Stalking? I didn’t know that was a prefect duty.”
He rolled his eyes, “Okay, come on. Just say yes.”
“No.”
He leaned in closer, “Was that a yes?”
He slammed his book shut, “If you don’t leave I will start throwing hex’s.” His anger bubbled up as fast as it disappeared.
Lupin put his hands up in a mock surrender. “Fine, that’s a no.” He didn’t leave, just stared, like he wanted to ask something. He must’ve thought better of it, good, because he disappeared around a bookshelf instead.
Regulus held his head in his hands, a messy spiral of memories and feelings. It only got worse as time went on.
The next morning a letter came to him from his parents, he regretted opening it entirely, throwing it in the bin as Evan watched with a worried gaze.
He almost lived in the library and with each book the less he slept, day turned to night without a thought. His focus dropped, his friends' words fell on clouded ears. All he could see was memories, all he could think about was death and everything else didn’t feel important.
“Regulus!” Dorcas grabbed his elbow as he walked down an arched corridor, the book in his hand almost falling as he lost his place. “I’m talking to you.”
Regulus felt as annoyed as she sounded, “What?”
“Quidditch trials, there in a bit, I came to find you knowing you’d have forgotten.”
He kept his face still at the accusation, “I didn’t forget, I’m just busy.”
She didn’t believe him, it was written all over her face but she didn’t say it. “Learning dark magic? Looking at ancient artifacts? What- what are you doing?” Her voice was quiet but it felt like a yell with how forceful she spoke.
He didn’t really think to have an explanation for that, “Just- reading.”
“Great and now you can just- come judge the Quidditch trials with me and Emma.” She started to walk away with a very forced smile.
Regulus started to object and she turned on him quickly. “What was that?” She snapped. “Your following me?” She walked backwards and Regulus really didn’t want to find out what she would do if he didn’t step forwards. “Good.”
He went to the Quidditch trials, Emma was writing on a desk that had been set up on the field behind the castle. “Finally.” She sighed, giving them both a piece of paper. Mulciber was also sitting there but Dorcas pulled him into a chair next to her, not giving him time to question her lie.
“Let's begin!” Emma motioned for the first person in the queue to step in front. They only needed three players, two chasers, a beater and a sub for the goalie.
Dorcas taking the other chaser position, Emma the beater, Mulciber the Keeper and Regulus the seeker.
One by one they came up, declared the role they wanted and another role they'd sub and train for.
Each one was worse than the next, the try outs were simple. Mulciber demonstrated drills that they’d do on their brooms and if they wanted they could do something else afterwards, like if they wanted to be seeker they’d chase something. It was simple.
Yet, each person acted like they’d asked them to pull down the sky. They watched as someone threw the Quaffle in the air, tried to hit it but instead it landed behind them. How?
“If this doesn’t pick up the pace, I’m gonna lose it.”
“Well why don’t you go up there and show them how it’s done?” Dorcas retorted, watching the next person shake through the drill, not looking at him.
“This is supposed to be a try out, not a tutorial.” He muttered back.
“That’s because they lowered the bar for when you joined.” Mulciber leaned over the table to say.
“If anything they raised the bar.”
“So confident,” He smirked. Dorcas rolled her eyes as she watched the next person fly up. “Must be nice to live in a fantasy.”
“I can certainly tell you this isn’t a fantasy because why beyond Salazar’s grave would you be here.”
“Another word-” Emma cut in as the flyer dismounted, “Thank you, another word and I’ll cut off your balls to use as Bludgers next practise.” Her tone changed quickly to the people trying out and her team.
They looked away from each other as another flyer came out. He started doing the drill and then mid air, on his broom, put up both his legs and did the splits.
“Freak.”
Regulus would swear he heard Dorcas mutter the word. He smiled and put a hand to his mouth.
“Woaow-” Emma drawled through surprise as he dismounted from his broom via backflip. “Well, that- that was impressive. Good job…”
“Can we end it yet?”
“There’s still ten more people in the queue.”
Regulus almost killed himself right there, as if reading his thoughts a broom came flying straight at the desk. Dorcas and Regulus had to duck the most, the broom snapping in half behind them.
“Sorry…” Someone yelled from across the field, Emma had to enforce a time out to compose herself.
When the torture finally stopped and Emma let them go Regulus walked behind Dorcas. “You’re annoyed with me.” It wasn’t a question, he didn’t need to ask really.
“Don’t you have somewhere to be- so busy these days.” She replied, pushing her way through the corridor.
Regulus winced, feeling guilty but then he remembered why he has been so busy and the guilt goes away. “I deserve that but it- it’s important, okay?”
Dorcas stopped, breathing a heavy sigh. “Then what is it?”
“What?”
“If it’s something important, then tell me about it.” She doesn’t really ask, she stands there with her lips together as if she doesn’t expect him to answer.
She’d be right. “I can’t.”
“Right,” her words tense. “So you’ve been ignoring your friends, declining hang outs, pushing us all away- Pandora away. I mean- did something happen with your parents?” Her concern is genuine but her anger out shadows it. “Because you’ve never been this shitty of a friend.”
It’s a punch to the gut because he wanted to be better, wanted to be more free. He did want to do more with his friends at the start and now he’s spent the better part of two weeks completely ignoring them. He had hope that he’d be happier but all he’s done is make everyone else feel bad.
“If something did happen,” she knows somethings wrong and that thought terrifies him. “We- we’re all here for you, okay?”
All he can hear are the screams of Bertha Jorkins, imagining Dorcas in the middle of that room. “It’s not a big deal, everything’s fine.”
Her face drops, “You’re gonna have to talk, about whatever is happening at one point.”
“There’s nothing to talk about-”
A sharp exhale comes out her nose, “So- that's it? What, you- you gonna ignore us all again? Start treating us like you treat your brother?”
He feels anger build up, threatening to explode. “You don’t get to do that- I don’t owe you an explanation about him, about what I’m doing, none of it. It is none of your business.”
“As your friend? It is. I’m trying to be here for you- we all are.”
“I didn’t fucking ask you to- so you can stop, just fuck off!”
She sends him a disgusted, confused look, one that sends his mouth moving to say more but he cant find words. She’s half way down the corridor before he gets his bearings, ‘I’m doing this for you guys.’ His mind supplies but it doesn’t make him feel better.
He buries himself in books, suffocating from his own words.
Evan doesn’t talk to him in their dorm, Barty doesn’t come to visit, Pandora’s probably with Dorcas. He deserves it, he has been a shitty friend but he’d rather be a shitty friend then see them all die because of him.
With all the constant reminders, memories, it’s not surprising it’d all add up. The frustration, anger, sadness; they’re leeches that take and take. That night, he wakes up screaming.