Evan’s busy reaching across the bar for a couple of drinks, arm outstretched and easy smile on his face, when Regulus walks up next to him.
“Two butterbeers, please,” Regulus nods to the bartender.
Evan turns his head in surprise, clearly not expecting to have been followed. “I was getting you guys drinks, you know. You didn’t have to get up.”
“Yeah, I know. But I needed a bit of a break from all… that.” Regulus tilts his head towards a booth in the corner, indicating the chaos currently taking place there. He’s just escaped the aftermath of Barty attempting to flirt with Remus just to make Sirius mad, which has not ended well. Just like Barty intended. Honestly, Regulus doesn’t know why he puts up with him.
Regulus opens his mouth to continue, feeling somewhat hesitant. He’s not sure how Evan will react to what he’s about say, but he’s going to try anyways. “And also because I wanted to ask you something in private. Or at least, away from them.”
“Hold on,” Evan replies. The bartender’s just handed him his drinks, and he’s trying to find a way to carry them. “Okay, carry on.”
Regulus doesn’t waste any time. “You’re in love with Barty.”
Evan doesn’t look up from the drinks, not giving Regulus’s accusation even a slight reaction. “That wasn’t much of a question, Reg.”
If Regulus didn’t know better, he’d say Evan was completely unbothered by this whole situation. But he does know better, and Evan’s completely straight face as he fiddles with the glasses is a dead giveaway.
“You’re not going to deny it?” He’s genuinely curious. It’s unlike Evan to not, at the very least, try to avoid answering directly.
“Why would I? It’s the truth, and I know you’re not going to tell him.”
“But you’re not really the type of person to be okay with… sharing this sort of thing.”
Evan looks up now, small smile making its way to his face. “No, I’m usually not. But honestly it’s been going on so long that it’s more trouble than it’s worth to keep it hidden. From you, at least.”
“I—” he pauses, not entirely sure what to do with that. “How long has this been a thing?”
“Oh, about…” Evan squints, as if he can look back in time and pinpoint the exact moment it started. “Five years now?”
“Five years?”
“Don’t sound so surprised, Reg.”
“Why shouldn’t I?”
“Because it’s really not that out of character for me.”
Evan flashes another smile and makes to leave, but Regulus blurts out, “Why haven’t you done anything about it? If it’s been so long?”
Evan glances over at their booth. Regulus follows his gaze, where Barty is now gesturing wildly with his hands in what is probably an attempt to avoid death at Sirius’s hands.
“Because,” Evan says, still looking at Barty, “it would ruin our relationship.”
He sounds so resigned to the fact that Regulus’s heart clenches. He feels like a bad friend. He had no idea, absolutely none, that Evan had been feeling this way for such a long time. “You can’t know that.”
Evan looks back at him, amused expression on his face as he asks, “Can’t I? It’s Barty; even if he did feel the same way—which he doesn’t—he would never be able to let himself commit to a relationship. The fear and discomfort would eat him alive. You know that.”
Regulus does, in fact, know that. But it doesn’t stop him from wanting to fix this, somehow. From wanting to try to get Evan to fight for a chance, at the very least. “But you’re Evan. There used to be be bets about when you guys would finally sort out your shit and start going out.”
Evan blinks, clearly not having known that.
“And it wasn’t because people knew you were in love with him—hell, I didn’t even know that—it was because of the way you both look at and act around each other. And I know that you’re too smart to have not noticed any of that, Evan.”
“Well. Maybe. But that’s also just who he is. He looks at practically everyone like that, acts like that with everyone. So you can stand there and tell me that I’m special, but I’m always going to see that for what it is. A lie, Regulus. And I don’t need you to lie to me. This whole thing is already bad enough already, I don’t need you adding to it, too.”
“But—”
“Don’t, Regulus. Just don’t.”
Regulus changes tactics. “How can you stand it?”
Evan gives a sad smile. “Like you said; I’m Evan. I’m always going to be in love with him, no matter what he does, really. And he’s Barty, so he’s going to do a lot of shit. But that’s just the way things are, I suppose.”
“So you’re just going to let him shatter your heart and stomp all over it?”
Evan smiles bitterly. “He’s been doing that for years, Reg. You’re a bit late to the game.”
Regulus hates this, hates Evan’s defeated tone and tired eyes. “How are you just so calm about this? Don’t you hate it?”
Evan considers that. “I did, for a while. I spent a long, long time hating it. But it only cost me energy I couldn’t afford to lose, and it didn’t change anything in the end.”
And there’s not a lot Regulus can say in response to that, so instead he eyes Evan: the regretful smile, the sad slump of his shoulders, and the way his body is subconsciously turned towards Barty, even now. “Are you… going to be okay?”
“Of course, Reg, why would you even ask?” He smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. “This is just the hand life has dealt me. I’m used to it by now. You might as well get used to it, too. Nothing’s going to change between Barty and me.”
And with that, he shoulders past Regulus, drinks in hand. And Regulus watches him go, unable to unsee how painfully in love Evan is. He watches the way Barty’s entire face lights up when he sees Evan, he watches the soft smile Evan gives Barty in return, and he prays to anyone who’s listening that Evan will turn out to be wrong.
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Things I don’t get about the marauders fandom as someone who’s been obsessed with them for literal years
1. How we let so many characters be only children?? like I get that people don’t necessarily want to make OCs but HOW did it get to this? James, Marlene, Peter, Remus, Mary, Barty, Dorcas, Alice, Frank and so many others! Idk maybe it’s just where I’m from but look me in the eyes and tell me you know that many people who don’t have siblings ALSO the ratio is so off and barely any of them have only child energy. It’s just not right.
2. How sooo many of you aren’t multi shippers. Like what do you MEAN you can only see James with Regulus and Regulus with James?? What about bartylus? what about sunrose? what about draksun/sunkiller? what about moonwater? what about jily? what about prongstail? WHAT do you read?? Aren’t you bored??? WHAT DO YOU MEAN you only have ONE ship for each character???? As a multi shipper, I can be convinced of any ship with anything ranging from a real good fic or a pretty edit to an enthusiastic rant from a random person on TikTok and it just makes things interesting. Maybe my adhd brain just needs more ships to focus on or maybe some of you just lack flexibility ( or imagination), but we need to fix this cause there aren’t enough fics with the ships I like 😭😭
3. THE SHIP NAMES. I can’t be the only one who thinks some of these suck right? Like why are we saying jegulus when starchaser and sunseeker are RIGHT THERE?? Same with jily and flowerpot, and bartylus and starkiller. ALSO some names make me wonder if some of you just haven’t grasped the concept of ship names or if I just got it all wrong cause marylily and jegulily are just annoying, why are we keeping the L in Lily? The point is to merge the names together not stick them one beside the other, I just say marily and jeguily because it rolls off the tongue so much more easily
4. The Peter erasure. I just don’t get it, it’s so easy to include him in things, you don’t have to make him a main character, but just mention him every once in awhile. Sometimes I’m reading an important scene in a fic and everyone is mentioned EXCEPT for Peter! It’s so easy, just make him roll his eyes at his friends being idiots or something. And it’s not like you’ll get his personality wrong, ALL THESE CHARACTERS PERSONALITIES WERE MADE UP BY FANS but I understand that some people lack imagination so here’s some things about Peter I like to imagine: he’s a HUGE gossip, like my man sees and hears everything and he takes notes!! He likes to randomly turn into a rat and take a nap in one of the other marauders’ pocket, he does it so much that they had to tell the girls that they had a pet rat cause they were asking too many questions. He’s really perceptive and his friends are all oblivious so it leads to funny scenarios like:
Remus & Sirius after YEARS of pining: we’re dating
Peter: I thought you guys had been together since third year?
Sirius: I’ve literally introduced you to people I was dating?!
Peter, shrugging: look mate I don’t question you lot anymore, you do whatever you want, I don’t care what you’re into, I just don’t wanna know about it
He also pulls people, like he’s really nice and will gossip to anyone who’s in his vicinity so he’s friends with basically everyone and he’s funny and pretty and he’s got charisma so he just charms everyone and when I say everyone, I mean everyone, even the slytherins have a soft spot for him (that’s how he gets accepted among the death eaters during the war actually). In pranks he’s the lookout so he often has to distract the teachers so he asks them random things and spits out half-made up facts about anything so he’s besties with most of the teachers which means he doesn’t get many detentions.
5. The Black brothers, more specifically the way the speak to each other in most fics, like they call each other “brother” so often and as someone who has a brother I’ve never called him that. Is it an anglophone thing? Like do people who speak English at home all do that or are fic writers only children?? (That would explain my first point actually) Or is it more a rich people thin?? Cause I know it’s not a francophone thing that’s for sure (also special mention to people who don’t know anything about French writing Sirius and Regulus as French speakers, I can tell you don’t know what you’re writing about but I eat it up everytime anyway)
6. This is actually just about ao3 but I WANNA BE ABLE TO LEAVE MORE KUDOS!!! I just loooooove fics but I can’t leave kudos at every single chapter and I’m bad at writing comments so I can’t show the author how much I love their work, I hate itttt 😭
7. Why there aren’t more fics about the Black family, and not just Sirius and Regulus, but Andromeda, Bellatrix and Narcissa as well like that would be so interesting and maybe like a deep dive into the Black family ideals and all that (if you have fic recs I’m all ears!!)
8. How jegulily is a pretty popular ship (which I LOVE) yet SO FEW people ship Regulus and Lily outside of it! They are a power couple and I love them and they don’t need James to work!!!
9. Why there isn’t more background Minnie x Poppy cause they are my mothers and I wanna see them moooooreeee
If you read all of this I love you 🥰 have an amazing day/night
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