unspeakable | jegulus

i'll do anything for you

chapter title: honey, just allow me one more chance by bob dylan

All of his skin burned when he was back inside.

His mother guided him to the sink and washed the blood off of him in silence. The lukewarm water felt boiling hot against his angry, icy skin. The snow melted in his hair and his clothes. He left a trail of icy water behind him when he walked past the living room where his father, Regulus, and Sirius were all sitting together. Their conversation fell silent when he walked into the room. He swallowed sharply and kept moving, walking past to change into something dry. Regulus shot to his feet instantly and trailed after him like a puppy. He grabbed at his arm and touched the (overkill) muggle bandage his mother wrapped around his cut when she realized it refused to heal with magic. James irritably jerked his arm away from his hand.

"I'm fine," he spat, and knew he sounded very much the opposite. He forced himself to soften. "I need to change into dry clothes, I'll come right back. Stay here." The last pair of words were clearly not a request. Regulus' pale eyes were enormous. His lips pressed together flatly and his eyebrows quirked, his head tilted to one side. He needed to talk to him. James nodded once, resignedly.

He didn't particularly want to take a detour to talk with Regulus about anything, he was exhausted in his bones, but it wouldn't be worth it to ignore him or to try to brush him off. His room looked a bit forlorn with all of the empty places on the wall that pictures used to inhabit, like skin paler than the rest–skin sun hadn't touched. It's unchangingness, when he was so different, crept under his skin with the cold, burning. He felt out of place everywhere now.

He asked Regulus, when he'd stripped off his cold, wet clothes, "What is it? What do you want?"

"You left me here with your father, who hates me, and my brother, who hates me, alone." Regulus frowned.

"My dad doesn't hate you. Honestly, a big part of it is shit he will never say, or even let himself think too much. I think he feels weird about me being gay, but he won't ever say anything about it because my mum would kill him." Regulus arched an eyebrow, like James was proving his point. He sighed. "You left me alone at the Malfoy party. I had to fend for myself. I figured you would be fine." James pulled on another shirt, an almost unbearably sunny yellow, and a pair of neat trousers. He thought the yellow shirt would make him feel more cheerful for some reason, but it only made him feel infinitely worse. He pinched it, stared at it resentfully, then pulled it off. He rummaged through his closet for something that might actually make him feel better and settled on something Remus had given him last Christmas. A blue t-shirt (with Bowie on it, because Remus gives the best gifts). Regulus was being eerily silent. "I'm sorry, I'm kind of freaking out. I should have thought of you more. You were nervous to come here. I shouldn't have been such a dick." James turned, and Regulus pulled him into his arms. "What are you–?"

"I love you." Some of the ice in the middle of him started to soften. "You're freezing." Regulus pressed his cheek against James' cheek. He was so warm it felt like touching the sun. "You need a sweater." He turned and rummaged in his own bag, which made James furrow his eyebrows in confusion, because his closet was yawning wearily behind them. Regulus pulled out one of his sweaters, a rare one in his closet that was a bit oversized for him, thick, cable knit, impossibly soft black cashmere. He unceremoniously tugged it over James' head and put it on him. It fit him oddly perfectly. When he looked at his reflection in passing, when they left his room, he realized he looked the way he had when he got on the train for break and had looked ever since.

He looked like he belonged in the House of Black. He looked like a version of himself that had been smoothed over, somehow, made shiny and blemishless. A proper pureblood, not a blood-traitor in casual muggle clothes. He was wearing the only sort of muggle clothes that someone like Regulus would ever be willing to wear. This was how he'd been dressing every day of Yule break, in sweaters like this, in neat trousers. It didn't feel odd for him anymore. No one else would even notice this little change. Casual t-shirts and jeans traded in for something more expensive and put together. Grown up. Adult. Regulus kept touching him, his shoulders, his waist, with a possessive and a queer sense of pride, while they made their way back to the living room. James rolled his eyes and pulled him close, keeping him under his arm, pressing a kiss into his hair. They paused next to the Christmas tree. Regulus touched one of the glowing paper stars his father liked to put up with only his fingertip. So long and pale, pink-knuckled.