“This is going to end in blood,”
“You’re literally so dramatic, it will be fine,” Sirius said as he piled different snacks into the shopping cart.
“You’re calling me dramatic?” Regulus sighed. “Plus, you’re only on board with this because Remus looks hot when he’s all invested in football.”
“Did you just call my boyfriend hot?” Sirius was holding two chip flavors for Regulus to choose from as he asked this.
“The left one. And that’s beside the point, everyone knows Remus is hot. Marlene and Dorcas literally gave him a mug that says ‘only m*n we would date’ and Evan and Barty would kill for him to go out with them.” Regulus said as they made it to check out.
“Well, I get to win at the end of the day.” Sirius said, “Wait, Evan and Barty what?”
Regulus sighed and ignored his brother as they bagged their groceries and headed out. Sirius’s brilliant idea of the day was to invite James and Regulus over to watch the England and Wales match in the World Cup. In Sirius’s defense, Remus does look incredibly hot when he’s all riled up about football, so does Regulus’s darling boyfriend, but he was trying to be impartial here. Regulus knows that bringing two of the most diehard football fans that are totally and completely devoted to their teams of choice together to watch a fate-defining match wasn’t the way to go, so does Sirius somewhere deep down in his currently horny clouded brain. This was not going to go well for anyone involved and no excuse Regulus could think of on the drive home would stop his brother or his boyfriend from going through with this.
When they made it to Sirius and Remus’s apartment, James and Remus were already mid heated argument. So engrossed that they didn’t even notice the other two come in. Sirius just went to the kitchen to unload their groceries while Regulus stood to the side, leaning on a wall, and watching his extremely hot boyfriend get so defensive over a game Regulus did not give two flying fucks about. God, how did he let himself fall for a sports guy?
“No, because if they did have a good defense strategy, Moony, they wouldn’t be in this situation to begin with. I mean have you see-Oh hi, love,” James paused his apparently very sound argument or whatever to smile at his boyfriend. Regulus hated the smile on his own face right now. He hated James Potter. He hated him so much he was making his way towards him right now.
Regulus hated James so much he gave him a kiss and greeting and went to wrap his arm around his boyfriend’s waist, earning himself a raised eyebrow from Remus which he promptly ignored. “Starting the fight early, are we?” He asked.
“No, no fights at all. Moony and I agreed to be civil about this, be a good sport and all.” James said reassuringly to which Remus nodded half-heartedly, because unlike James, Remus was self-aware enough to know he will not, in fact, be civil, whatever the outcome of this match is. “You and Sirius have nothing to worry about, best behaviors only tonight.”
Best behaviors, when you think about them, like really ponder the concept, are subjective. Like if Remus sent a string of curses at the screen and occasionally at James, it could still be seen as best behaviors. And if James laughed or made snide remarks at the opposing team every now and then to get on Remus’s nerve, it could technically be considered best behavior. And if Sirius was staring at Remus the entire time with a dreamy stare and quite literally twirling his hair as he snacked on the chips in front of him, then one could possible say this was also best behaviors. And if Regulus watched all of this unfold before his eyes and did nothing to prevent the inevitable doom, just because it might be entertaining and as much as he would never admit to anyone, he did enjoy a bit of drama, then this could also pass for best behaviors. It is, after all, very very subjective.
England’s first goal was not so bad, James screamed and Remus just glared angrily at the TV that Regulus was certain it would go up into flames. By the time the second goal came around, Remus almost punched James after he whooped loudly and said something not so nice about Remus’s beloved Welsh time. The minute the ball hit Wales’s goal a third time, Regulus was about ready to bury himself alive. Even Sirius looked slightly alarmed at this, but quickly went back to ogling his boyfriend as he went into a stream of curses that didn’t seem like they were ever going to end.
Needless to say, this night did not end well. Especially considering the fact that Wales lost to England, while they were at Remus’s place. When Regulus said this would end in blood, he meant it, and it did, metaphorically of course, but still. Remus and James went at it for hours after the game, arguing and analyzing and criticizing, all while Regulus sat anxiously to the side and Sirius all but drooled at his boyfriend. At the end of the day, Regulus had to physically remove James before Remus all but kicked them out, or hell even Sirius could’ve kicked them out at this point with the way he was eyeing Remus.
“I mean, we didn’t even have sex Reggie,” Sirius said over the phone the next day to which Regulus groaned. “I always get sex after a match, so much so if it’s an important one.”
“Ew, Sirius, please do not indulge me in the works of your sex lives,” Regulus said. “But since we’re on the topic, I did, in fact, get so much sex last night, not that it’s a contest or anything. But if it were, I am winning.” Regulus smirked as his brother gagged and made disgusted noises on the other end. “And well, seeing as your boyfriend’s team all but lost, it would seem fair that you did not get sex after this particular match,”
“First of all, never mention you and sex in the same sentence to me ever again,” Sirius said. “And second, I think we might have a slightly bigger problem than me not having sex with my extremely hot boyfriend, despite this still being very much a big problem.”
The bigger problem, as it turns out, is that Remus all but refuses to talk to James. He is evoking the silent treatment card and planning to abuse it to its full potential. The silent treatment card, as the boys called it, was something they came up with back in high school whenever they argued too much about something or were on opposite sides of some silly debate. Any of the parties could evoke the silent treatment card and they get to decide how long it’ll last. Remus, being the one who evoked it in this scenario, gets to decide how long he’s ignoring James for. Nine days, he’d decided. Three for each goal against Wales. A catastrophic addition to the bigger problem, as Sirius put it, was that Remus wasn’t having sex with Sirius for those nine days as well. Remus said it’s because Sirius is English, to which Regulus laughed and said Remus is talking to me just fine -he wasn’t- and Sirius promptly hung up on him. Remus did, in fact, text him later, so it wasn’t really a lie.
Throughout the nine days, Sirius would text Regulus daily, not that he didn’t already, but he did so even more now and with things Regulus had less interest than usual to know. Complains about Remus ignoring him, his failed attempts at seducing Remus, Remus going to the gym at night. “The gym, Reggie, the fucking gym?? he doesn’t even like the gym!!” Regulus remembers his brother whining. Throughout those nine days, Regulus would also get random texts from Remus that he knew were meant for James. Random links to silly buzzfeed quizzes and pictures of the clouds captioned “this looks like an alien pushing a baby in a stroller” or something like that. Regulus would silently forward them to James and James would give him a knowing smile. Regulus didn’t really get the dynamics of this friend group, and he wasn’t sure he ever would, but he did admire how much they cared for each other. This silent treatment thing, in their own way, was them loving each other by standing in the way of any impending fights over things that were far less important than their friendship.
On the tenth day, Regulus and James were back at Sirius and Remus’s place. Sirius would not shut up about how much sex he got out of this nine-day madness, much to Regulus’s dismay, and James was trying so hard not to bring up anything football related as per the new rules put forward by Peter, who was the impartial unbiased judge during the cursed nine days of silent treatment, another rule they apparently had. While Sirius and James loudly discussed Sirius’s sex life, Regulus dragged Remus out to the balcony where they could have a drink and he would be spared from the absurd details of his brother’s whatever.
“So, when did you give up?” Regulus asked as he took a sip of his drink.
Remus gave him an innocent look and leaned against the railing. “Whatever do you mean, baby black?”
“Oh cut the crap, Remus, we both know you caved but were too stubborn to admit defeat. So, when was it?”
“Day three.” Remus sighed but a fond smile sat on his lips. “I’ll spare you the Sirius details,” Regulus nodded appreciatively. “I wanted to call James to talk about this clue in the Friday crossword, the answer was Prongs, and I knew he’d find that absolutely hilarious. I even kept a clipping of it because his dramatic ass would want to frame it.” He shook his head and Regulus found himself fighting a smile of his own. “But you know, Lupins don’t just give up, so I had to suck it up. I kept a journal of things I wanted to say to James, you know the ones I didn’t send to you and you pretended to be confused by, and things I wanted to do to Sirius.” Regulus winced and Remus just laughed. “Sorry, it slipped. Anyways, no matter how idiotic these two can be, one can’t simply shake them off.”
Regulus smiled and glanced back at his brother and the love of his life as they talked animatedly on the couch. “No, one simply can not.”