It was early December when Sirius cornered James in the common room.
He dropped into the armchair opposite like he owned it—legs sprawled, eyes sharp. “You’ve got a girlfriend,” he said, pointing a finger at James like he was accusing him of treason.
James blinked at him over the top of his Charms notes. “What?”
Sirius leaned forward. “Don’t play dumb. You’ve definitely got a girlfriend.”
James gave a half-laugh, already bristling. “Don’t be thick.”
“You’re covered in love bites, Prongs.”
James flushed. His hand flew to his collar, tugging it up, but too late—the edge of a dark bruise peeked out just above the neckline of his jumper. The closer they got to the holidays, the more frantic Regulus became—and the more distant. He barely spoke, barely looked at James in daylight, but at night—
At night he clung.
Last night, he’d kissed James like he was drowning. Like his mouth was the only thing keeping him tethered. It no longer felt like want; it felt like panic. Like desperation.
James swallowed. Forced a shrug.
Sirius sat back in the chair, arms crossed, foot tapping against the hearthstone and watched James with narrowed eyes. James turned back to his notes, but the words refused to hold still. They blurred, rearranged, dissolved into nothing. James was terrified. He felt like he was losing Regulus and he didn’t understand it. Regulus wouldn’t talk to him. Wouldn’t tell him what was wrong. But James knew something was—could feel it in the way Regulus touched him now— frantic and feverish, like he was trying to memorise James with his body.
There were other signs too.
A group had formed—or maybe just solidified. Fused together from the edges of other smaller cliques. They sat at the far end of the Slytherin table. From James’s year: Avery. Dolohov. Snape. The Lestrange brothers. From the year below: Yaxley and McNair. And with them?
Regulus and Rosier.
James’s heart sank the first time he walked into the Great Hall and saw them seated with the others—Rosier and Regulus side by side, flanked by Yaxley and Rabastan Lestrange. Their heads bowed in low conversation. Like they belonged there. James told himself it didn’t mean anything, that the rumours about those families were just rumours. He clung to that belief like a lifeline. Like if he held it tightly enough, it would keep Regulus safe. Keep them safe.
And then, on the last night of term, in the Room of Requirement, when it was late and still and snow had only just begun to settle against the castle windows, Regulus looked at him.
Really looked at him.
And said:
“I love you.”
It should have been joy. James had waited so long— so long —to hear those words.
Instead, something in him cracked.
Because Regulus said it like it hurt .
Like it cost him.
Like it was a goodbye .
James reached out. Touched his face. Kissed him, soft and reverent, like he could hold him in place a little longer.
“I love you too,” he whispered.
He meant it. Every syllable. But the dread was already blooming in his chest. Quiet and cold. It curled under his ribs and stayed there. He carried it all the way onto the train. All the way through the Christmas holidays.
It stayed. It settled. And it whispered, over and over, that something was ending. That the last time he’d held Regulus might have been the last.
Christmas was hell.
James tried to play it off. Told his mum he was just tired. Told Sirius he was catching up on sleep. But he couldn’t shake it—the weight in his chest like stone. Like warning.
He didn’t eat much. Couldn’t sleep. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw grey eyes and trembling fingers, and the soft, breaking I love you that hadn’t sounded like love at all.
Sirius noticed. Of course he did. Snapped at him when James snapped first. Told him to stop mooning around like a Victorian widow. James told him to piss off.
They didn’t talk for two days.
James tried to do what he’d done over summer. Tried to write it out. Poured himself into letters—told himself he’d give them to Regulus when they got back to school. That it would be fine. That he was just spiralling. That the dread wasn’t real . That everything would be alright once they were back together again.
But it wasn’t.
It took three days back at school for James to be sure— absolutely sure—that Regulus was avoiding him.
Not in the pretend way he used to—all the while slipping glances across corridors. No. This was real.
James knew Regulus’s schedule better than his own. He could spot him in a crowd by the tilt of his shoulders. But every time James tried to catch him, to talk to him, Regulus would disappear.
James sent five owls in the first week. None were answered.
By Friday, James went looking. He found Rosier outside the library just after supper, a book tucked under one arm. His blue eyes flicked up the moment James approached.
He didn’t speak. Didn’t even raise an eyebrow.
He just turned and walked into the library.
James followed without hesitation, through the heavy oak doors and into the cavernous quiet. Rosier led him deep into the stacks, past rows of spines and shadow, until he stopped beneath one of the taller shelves and leaned casually back against it and waited. Like he’d known this was coming. Like he’d been expecting James.
Up close, Rosier looked wrong—something in him had dulled. The usual dry amusement was gone. The smirk, the casual indifference—all stripped away. A grim set to his mouth.
James stopped in front of him.
Rosier’s eyes met his. He didn’t roll them. Didn’t smirk.
James swallowed, throat thick. “He won’t answer my owls, he won’t look at me, he won’t speak to me—please, just tell him I need to talk to him.”
Rosier looked at James for a long moment—long enough for the silence to press in on James’s ribs like a vice. Then, finally, Rosier said, “I’ll tell him.” It was low. Resigned. He walked away.
And James stood there alone in the stacks, dread crawling under his skin like cold water. Something was wrong. He knew it. Knew it in his bones.
The weekend passed with no word from Regulus.
On Monday, James snapped.
He sent another owl—this one a frantic, ink-smeared scrawl barely legible:
If you won’t talk to me, I’ll come to the Slytherin common room. I’ll wait outside until you do. I don’t care who sees.
And he meant it.
James went to the dungeons.
The torches burned low in their brackets, casting shadows that stretched long across the stone floor. It was cold—sharply, bitterly cold—and he could feel it in his bones. But he didn’t move. He sat himself down beside the entrance to the Slytherin common room. Back against the wall. Arms folded. Jaw clenched tight.
And waited.
Ten minutes passed.
Twenty.
He ignored the curious glances, the muttering, the deliberate steps taken wide around him. No one stopped him. No one challenged him. He wasn’t sure if that made it better or worse.
Thirty minutes.
And then the door opened.
Regulus stepped out.
“You can’t be down here,” he hissed, the words barely audible. His voice cracked with panic. Before James could respond, Regulus seized him by the arm and dragged him down the corridor, sharp-heeled and furious. He shoved open the door to a disused classroom, slammed it shut behind them, and whirled around.
“You’ll ruin everything, ” he said. His voice wasn’t angry. It was desperate.
“I just want to talk—” James started.
“Fine,” Regulus cut in. “Midnight. Room of Requirement.”
And then he was gone.
James arrived early. Pushed open the door to the Room of Requirement like it might disappear before he reached it. The space was dim and quiet—its shape strange, uncertain, as if even the castle wasn’t sure what they needed anymore.
He sat. Waited.
And then the door opened.
Relief hit him so hard he almost gasped. He stood quickly—turned—
And froze.
The boy who walked in was Regulus, but it wasn’t his Regulus. His eyes were cold— empty , dull iron where once there had been stormlight. He moved like a statue remembering how to be human—each step too even, too careful. Shoulders squared. Spine straight. Face a mask.
No trace of the boy who kissed him like he was something precious. No hands reaching to trace the curve of James’s jaw like it was sacred. No quiet, aching smile. No fragile truth glinting behind long lashes—and then word by word, Regulus cut the threads between them. Neatly. Quietly. Surgically.
And James let him.
Because what else could you do, when the person you loved looked you in the eye and told you—calmly, clearly—that they didn’t love you back?
That it had never been real.
That none of it had ever been real.
"I have some of your things," said Regulus, voice calm, as if he didn't care, "your Cannons book, some clothes. Your leather Jacket."
James just stared at him, couldn't comprehend, couldn't understand. He thinks he tells Regulus that he doesn't give a shit about his things.
Regulus nods and James's world breaks. He stands there and watches as Regulus walks away—out of the Room, out of the fragile, half-hidden thing they’d built together—and closes the door behind him without looking back.
James stayed there a long time.
Eventually, he sat down.
He didn’t move until the following morning.
It snowed.
Then it rained.
Then it snowed again.
That snow melted and the days got longer, the air warmer and new leaves crept into existence on the branches of the trees around the castle.
James barely noticed the difference. The world outside the castle might as well have been a painting—flat, distant, untouched by the cold that had settled in his chest.
He went to class. Ate, sometimes. Still turned up to Quidditch practice, still barked commands about footwork and formations—but his voice didn’t sound like his own. It belonged to someone else now. A James-shaped shell.
The silence was worse than the heartbreak.
It gnawed at him in the quiet hours. It bled through the seams of everything. He had no one to talk to. No one to tell. No way to say, I’m falling apart because the person I loved stopped loving me. Because no one knew. Not any of it.
Not about Regulus.
Not the secret joy that had lived in his chest for over a year—and was now gone .
He couldn’t sleep. Couldn’t focus. Couldn’t look at Regulus across the pitch or in the Great Hall without a sharp pain searing through his chest. Regulus didn’t look back.
Not once.
His eyes passed over James like he was a stranger. Like nothing had happened. Like nothing had ever happened.
The weeks passed sluggishly. Time felt thick and airless. Just getting through the day felt like dragging himself through knee-deep mud. He was exhausted all the time—bone-deep and hollow. Practices blurred. Meals came and went. The part of him that felt real had been torn out leaving him bloodied and broken.
And somehow— somehow —no one noticed.
Not Sirius.
Not Pete.
Not even Remus.
No one noticed that he was walking around with a gaping wound where his heart used to be.
It felt surreal. Like a dream where everything looked normal, but the colours were wrong and no one could hear you scream.
And then came the match.
Gryffindor vs Slytherin.
The stadium was loud—roaring with House colours banners rippling in the wind—but to James, it might as well have been silent. All he saw was Regulus—sharp, fast, unreachable. Precision in motion. Untouchable. His form was flawless, every movement cut from instinct, the kind of brilliance that didn’t need force to dominate. Just clarity . He caught the Snitch in a perfect dive—sleek and effortless. James didn’t care that they lost. Barely registered the final whistle. Seeing Regulus soar through the sky, so close, and yet untouchable hurt too much for James to care about anything else at all.
He trudged off the pitch—mud caked on his boots, heart bruised and heavy—stood in the showers beneath the hot spray and swallowed down the painful lump in his throat. He got dressed slowly, moving automatically. Pants, socks, trousers–shirt. Not really seeing any of it, he didn’t even realise the changing room had emptied out until someone spoke.
“Tosspot,”
He looked up.
Rosier stood in the shadow of the changing room doorway. His hair was damp, and he’d swapped his quidditch robes for dark jeans and a long sleeved black t-shirt. James blinked at him. He’d never seen Rosier in anything other than school uniform, or quidditch gear—before. It took James a second to register that it was him. He looked tired, almost as rough as James felt. But his blue eyes were soft, sincere as he stepped further into the room.
“You doing okay?”
The question caught James off guard—not just the words, but the way he said them. Like he actually cared.
James blinked. Swallowed hard.
“Not really,” he said.
It scraped on the way out.
Rosier held James’s gaze for a moment—long enough for James to see it: recognition, maybe. Like he understood exactly what James meant.
“I figured,” Rosier said finally. “You look like hell.”
James let out a weak laugh. “Thanks. I feel worse.”
Rosier nodded. “I’m sorry.”
That was it. Just two words and yet they mattered, or perhaps it just mattered that someone had asked, had known to ask. It might’ve mattered more if James had known that this small, quiet exchange was the last one he’d have with Rosier before they ended up fighting on opposite sides of a war. But he didn’t know. Because that’s the thing about war: you never know—never know which time is the last time, not until it’s too late.
Somewhere in the grey months that followed Regulus—Lily started talking to James. Not with flirtation, not at first. Just casual. A year and a half ago, James would’ve been over the moon. As it was then, he was too caught up in his own misery to notice when it started happening. Not until they were halfway to becoming friends. As it turned out they got along rather well when James was too busy being heartbroken to try and woo her. Talking became hanging out. Hanging out became dating. Being with Lily was different. Easier. She teased him, and he made her laugh. It didn’t ache the way it had with Regulus. There were no secrets, no locked rooms or careful glances. Just hands held in hallways. Sunny afternoons by the lake with Remus, Sirius and Pete, trips to Hogsmead with Marlene, Dorcas and Mary and nights spent in front of the Gryffindor fireplace, curled on couches revising together. It was nice—being able to be together around his friends. To not have to hide anything. Comfortable. Easy.
James liked snogging her, too. They hadn’t done much more than snog, and he’d never told her that she wasn’t his first. First kiss, first love, first—anything. He couldn’t. Not when thinking about Regulus still hurt. Not when being with Lily didn’t fully fill the space he’d left behind.
But it was still good.
He didn’t love her. Not yet.
But he thought—he could. And he was happy. More or less. Happy to be with Lily. Happy to be almost done with school. Granted, he wasn’t thrilled about the state of the world—about the rumours of a war that were inescapable now—but aside from that, he was starting to feel okay again. Starting to feel more like a human and less like a walking, talking, shell of one.
N.E.W.T.s came and went like a fever dream.
James finished his last exam—Muggle Studies—five minutes early. Confident in his answers, he’d strolled out of the Great Hall with a spring in his step, paper dropped neatly on the invigilator’s desk. It was a warm afternoon, the kind that hummed with promise. The kind that made the world feel, briefly, weightless.
He headed for the lake, sun on his face, already picturing Lily waiting for him under the beech tree. She’d said she’d meet him there once she was done with Arithmancy. He could almost see it—the light in her hair, the curve of her smile. He was just passing the archway into the lower courtyard when he saw them.
Two figures, walking fast towards him, half obscured by the fountain. Blonde hair—broad shoulders, a flash of a green and silver tie— Rosier—and beside him a second figure. James caught a glimpse of dark hair and his heart stuttered, he didn’t wait to confirm. Panic flared hot in his chest and, without thinking, he ducked into the nearest alcove, pressing back into shadow. He couldn’t see Regulus today. Not now. Not when the sun was warm and his lungs were working properly and it had, for once, been a good day.
He didn’t want to ruin it. Didn’t want the cold spike of grief in his chest. Didn’t want to remember how it felt to be unchosen.
The footsteps stopped right outside the alcove.
“You’re a fucking hypocrite,” someone snapped—sharp, irritated. Not Regulus, definitely not Regulus.
A second voice followed, low and tense and unmistakably Rosier. “This isn’t a damn game Barty.”
James exhaled. Relief, brief and breathless, settled in his chest. Crouch. It was Crouch, not Regulus. He’d panicked over nothing. He felt stupid, and—then embarrassment at his own cowardice.
“I’m trying to protect you,” Rosier again, softer now. Fraying. “Just wait. Don’t do anything stupid over summer. Please.”
A tense silence and then someone sighed, Crouch. “You’re not going to talk me out of it.”
“Please—” Rosier said again, he sounded pained, almost desperate.
James’s breath caught in his throat.
He shrank back, deeper into shadow, heart hammering.
This—this wasn’t something he was meant to hear.
This was private .
When Crouch answered the anger was gone. What remained was something quieter, resigned. “I don’t want to fight. Not today. So if that’s what it takes to make you drop it—fine.”
“Thank you.” Rosier’s voice was soft. A breath of relief, barely more than air and then the footsteps resumed—fading into the distance. James peaked out from the alcove, and then when both figures had turned the corner—he stepped out, and continued on his way towards the lake.
The summer passed. James and Sirius moved into a flat in North London—it had bay windows and crooked staircases, tucked behind a row of beech trees. James’s parents had helped—insisted, actually. Effy had picked out the curtains. Fleamont cheerfully overpaid the stuffy estate agent with muggle currency he barely understood and then sent a celebratory owl with half a dozen bottles of wine and a cursed doorbell that wouldn’t stop singing.
They had space. Light and the luxury of choosing paint colours and pretending—for a little while—that adulthood was something soft and manageable.
Remus came by often. Because Sirius and Remus were Sirius and Remus now.
They didn’t say anything but James knew. Could see it in the way they looked at each other, the way they touched when they thought no one was looking.
James thought about saying something: when Remus had gone and Sirius was quiet in the next room, James would sit in the kitchen with his tea gone cold and wonder if he should say something. Because he knew. Knew what it was like—he had once been in love with a boy too.
But in the end he said nothing.
Perhaps because he didn’t want to admit who that boy had been, didn’t want to see anger in Sirius’s face, didn’t want to see the betrayal in those grey eyes that were so similar to Regulus’s. Or perhaps it was because it still hurt, and he didn’t want to invite that pain back in. Wanted to bury it. To forget it. To forget him.