- ̗̀STAG DAD

          Regulus has never been an idle man.

          He has always been patient, but never idle. Watching and waiting is not the same as doing nothing and here, in this place, despite its comforts and despite the calm, his fingers itch with the need for usefulness.

          He thinks perhaps that he and James are the same.

          When James lowers down to the floor Regulus sinks opposite him, with his back to the windows and his legs stretched out towards the middle of the room. Harry sits on his bum by his father’s leg, crashing his bright yellow Tonka into James’ knee with all the glee of an imaginative young boy screaming, “Bffff bfff bff bffff!” for the auditory effect. 

          It’s a pleasant, wholesome scene and Regulus can’t understand why he feels so unnerved. Perhaps it’s because he’s seen the terrible power of Voldemort first hand; because he shadowed him, followed him, believed in him and sat front row to the horrid means with which he would achieve his ends. Regulus knows the lengths to which he will go to find and destroy the Potters and now himself. 

          Having saved James, Lily and Harry was worth the loss of all his advantages.

          They’ve been the kindest to him since his introduction to the Order. Out of everyone they had been the warmest, the most grateful, the most trusting—and it’s due only to their acceptance of him that he hasn’t completely sunk to the isolation. A room full of people and here I am, an island still.

          Sirius has been less than welcoming—and part of Regulus thinks the only reason Sirius has agreed to his being involved at all is because of James. Ironic. After so many years of having regarded James as his enemy (something that Regulus isn’t sure was reciprocated), James is his biggest advocate. His (Regulus’ expression is halfway between a smile and a cringe as he thinks it)… friend.

          Remus doesn’t come around often—Regulus suspects he’s off doing something secretive, but doesn’t dare suggest what. Dumbledore wears a smile and watches him with twinkling eyes but Regulus can feel his distrust, his doubts, closing his manipulations around Regulus’ neck like the strings of a marionette. Lily has always been kind to him… and Harry? 

          The boy doesn’t know any better.

          They’re all right to be suspicious of him, he thinks. Saving the Potters could be some elaborate ploy to gain their trust and see them finally ended and the fact that James has become such an adamant ally of his is… shocking.

          But not unappreciated.

          Regulus leans his head back until it —thunks! into the wall, and he lazily watches Harry begin to turn over every toy and pillow in the room. He’s looking for something.

          Oh no.

          He pretends that he doesn’t know what Harry is looking for (foolishly, he hopes Harry will forget about his little toy car) and turns his eyes back to James.

          “… I’d like to.” More than anything he wants to finish what he started. It’s his job, his fault, his task. Were it not for Regulus they wouldn’t know about the horcrux at all—and were it not for his observational skills they wouldn’t know there was more than one (Regulus himself hadn’t put it together until much later). But he’s here, stuck between this place and his own safehouse because Voldemort is almost just as eager to catch the traitor than he is the Chosen One.

          It’s dangerous for all of them, now.

          “A person’s likely to go mad like this,” he looks down at his hands, touches his fingertips together each in turn as if to decide whether or not he’s still real. “The sensible part of you knows you should stay but the parts of you that know you can do more are hammering to get out.” Listen to him complain—how long have Lily and James been in hiding? Months before he got there. He takes a look at James—a long, scrutinizing look—and tries to decipher his expression. Being observant has always played to Regulus’ advantage but he’s still new to this place, to these people, and he often catches himself staring more often than he ought to. But the patterns are there, he thinks—the way they think, the way they behave… the kind of people they are.

          Very different than the people he came from.

          “How’re you feeling about it, then?” he ventures, trying not to train his eyes too hard on James’ gaze; trying not to look too interested. If he was James—which he certainly was not—he thought he might grow resentful of everyone else’s freedom. And were they really so different now? Both of them shackled to the calm safety of a safehouse for their own good.

          Well, what ‘good’ were they, doing nothing? 

          “You’ve been at this longer than I have. Watching your friends go off—” he gestures towards the door but stops, realizing he’s perhaps crossed an uncomfortable line. “Well… I’m sure there’ll be a horcrux or two left to find by the time it’s our turn.

          “The bastard.” 

               james gives that a look. it’s not so much that he’s getting better at   HIDING   his feelings on the subject, he’s just better at not verbalizing them. he’s moving his sons little tonka truck around like an airplane, with harry’s chubby fingers following it this way & that and   THAT   is truly the only reason he hasn’t gone mad.       well, MAD-DER.       he   WANTS   to go after peter. james knows he’s never been a particularly forgiving, think-before-you-leap man, but there is little he’s wanted   MORE   than to go after the traitorous rat. little he’s craved quite like the fire beneath his skin, burning his every touch. he needs to have him   EXPLAIN   not why   (he GETS why, honestly and truthfully he gets why),     but rather HOW. how he could betray not only his brother, but his nephew.   TWO YEAR OLD HARRY   who still clapped when uncle ‘womy’ walked in the room.                        well, truthfully james isn’t even sure he wants an explanation. maybe he really does just want   revenge   and that thought should scare him a whole lot more than it does.  and with that in mind, it makes sense he just so coincidentally got the first   ‘at home’   watch. why sirius, who isn’t tethered to the whole   ‘harry needs a father’   narrative like james is, was paired with lily. for all the things in this world james potter wants, nothing comes close to what he’ll   DO   for harry.         for harry, he’ll even sit still.            james relents the toy to his son when he finally catches it in a swift motion that makes james proud. 

                     james knows that it’s not technically spoken to   HIM.   sure he’s there, and that’s the excuse for projecting your thoughts into the endless abyss of the night, but it’s not   for   him. not really. it’s only been a few hours. hours that stretched into a lifetime, but the sun had only just set on a day that won’t end. maybe now it’s really sinking in.   they’ve run away.   well, running away implies that you belonged   THERE   in the first place, and james just doesn’t think that applies.   the noble and most ancient house of black was never a home.  it was more like... running to?   running towards?   maybe all it’s really called is   MOVING FORWARD.                   “ i didn’t know you   named   sirius’ snoring. ”         he jokes, moving from the upper stairs to sit next to regulus. pressed so close between to walls their shoulders skim. it would be a bit too much to hug him, and james very much doubts what he wants is pity. he’s like sirius in that way. they feel everything so strongly and then pretend they feel nothing at all. with sirius, james knows how to combat it. he’s learned from   years   of trial and error. they’ll fight about something minuscule, something neither of them actually care about and then they’ll end up screaming about the real shit. cathartic, and honestly a pretty streamlined process now that they’ve got the other pegged.                     regulus is different though. in a lot of ways. the brothers are more similar than either would dare to admit, but they come to in   VERY   different ways. honestly, james kind of thinks sirius sees this as   FREEING.   as he should, of course, the potters have said for years that sirius should call this his   PERMANENT   home, and it’s not like walburga gave him very many reasons to stay, but regulus holds something heavy on his shoulders. something james doesn’t know how to lift.                      he’s not sorry they came. he’s not sorry he encouraged it, or at the very least gave them the impression this was the place to go when they left, that in some small part he gave way to it all---     HE’S NOT SORRY.             but he doesn’t want regulus to be either.          he sighs. heavy with the weight of the day finally realized.        “ i know the room’s not as cozy as the dormitories but i think it’s got most of the title pieces. broken quaffle pieces, padfoot’s dirty socks  .  .  .   peter’s rotten candy that’s more experiment than edible at this point.   ----should feel right at home, ey? ”

          “Well don’t bring them ‘round here, they might catch sight of my Black family charm and feel even worse about themselves.” 

               “ i take it there are no mirrors in the slytherin common room? good for them, don’t want to scare the children. “

          “I had hoped…” Wishful thinking, apparently. “You obviously couldn’t keep away for   very long. Why are you so obsessed with me?”

                “ it’s my community service for the year, y’know helping out the less than fortune-looking. “

             “ surprise bitch, bet you thought you saw the last of me. “

           the funeral of Euphemia Potter was a solemn affair. Enough people congregated despite the event being in the middle of a wizarding civil war, and yet still James Potter felt the room did nothing to reflect the woman they ‘celebrated’. Everybody was either hiding or fighting and still, for one afternoon everyone who Euphemia Potter had ever touched met in a single room to speak about how she was in a better place now. And maybe if they hadn’t said the same thing to James about Fleamont a year earlier, or the Prewett brothers a few months previous to that. Maybe if the graveyard wasn’t overflowing James could understand their sympathy for what it was, but on this particular afternoon there was one thing he absolutely did not want. Pity. 

                      So during the reception James had snuck away after enough people had shook his hand and offered their ultimately useless condolences, and back to the church hall the last of his mother was kept in. He just wanted to be alone, just for a few moments. He and Sirius had been in & out of Order assignments, and on the rare moments he was ‘grounded’ he spent every waking moment with Lily. Or as much as he could without becoming overbearing. They were still relatively new, and wanting to seem lax and cool like they’d agreed upon at the beginning of starting this, they’d play the casual card. Sleeping in their own homes, often times, respecting privacy and all that. But Lily had only met his parents  a handful of times, and only once when they were ‘official’. He couldn’t throw this shit on her. Not now. Not when James had been toying with the idea of ending the ‘casual’ part of the ‘casual relationship’. What’s worse was he was thinking about all that right now. About how his mother and Lily were birds of the same independent feather and would’ve hated James’ tumble into his own mind. But his mother wasn’t here anymore. James was alone. 

        He felt rather than heard somebody join him on the pew. He’d had his head downcast, hands folded, and kneeling lightly—- almost like he was praying. And maybe he should have been. Praying that he would stop having to break out his stupid fucking all black suit, praying that he would stop having to break the news to those lucky enough to not be in the know, and praying that somehow he might survive this. Or maybe that at sometime in the future he’d even want to. But it was just now dawning on him that he was the last of the Potter’s line. His grandparents had died before James’ birth, and any uncles and aunts were distant memories. James Potter—- broken, unstable, fucked up James Potter was the last in a long line of prestigious wizards. Why hadn’t it been him?

          He knew it was Lily before she spoke, and when she did he felt the cord snap inside him. Lily’s words were soft and comforting. Her hands had moved to encompass James’ full form in her body and for a few seconds, James actually contemplated responding verbally. But when he moved to, his throat closed up and finally the weight of the day descended on him. He hadn’t cried. Not when St. Mungo’s called, not when he had to plan this whole damned event, and not when they closed the casket. But for some reason, Lily Evans holding James’ head to her chest, and rubbing soft circles on his back un-tethered him like a fucking child. 

They were in the midst of a war! A war that james willingly dove into & now he was sorry there were consequences? that was bullshit, and he was bullshit, and this... this most definitely was bullshit. And yet that was the tragedy of this world. James could yell, and fight, and cry as much as he wanted and all that would change is the time. 

But for once he didn’t feel like fighting. He felt like holding onto Lily until the church kicked him out & then some. If James’ headstone was next, then he was going to make his life something worth the honor bestowed upon him by the Potter last name. 

Tomorrow. Today he just really needed someone to tell him it would be okay. 

actually, killing curses are like measles once you got got once you are immune. don’t fuck with me I have the power of god & anime on my side