To Let it All go Down in Flames - jegulus/starchaser

A welcome distraction (james pov)

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no triggers i think

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Days are long and empty. Nights are short and blissful. Everything felt like it was falling apart besides the small, good moments every touch and kiss was like an Electric shock. The most that I've felt in just under a week.

It had been six days since the prank. 6 days. 144 hours. 8640 minutes. 518400 Second. Give or take. So much had happened within those six days, so many thoughts and feelings changed. 6 days. In those six days, I stopped talking to the most important people in my life. Started dating my ex best friend's little brother. Found a new form of happiness in someone else. Started eating lunch with Regulus in the kitchens. He claimed he didn't mind, Insisted on staying for other meals as well, but I made him go and socialize with his friends. Because you shouldn't give up the friends you have. I know that now. I know that you shouldn't waste time in the good moments. You should save them and keep them close. Don't let anyone take them away. I know that now. 6 days.

In those six days. Sirius Still pretended like everything was fine but There was a shift around him. As if people started listening to my quite plea or I don't know. Lily seemed to have stopped talking to him, she was attached at Remus's Hip. They were always together, whispering and talking. I was jealous of them, Still having your best friend, Still having that special connection with someone. Not being lied to about having that connection, Not being stabbed in the back by the person I assumed I knew, or at least hoped i knew. I thought that he had told her the whole story mostly because she stopped asking me what happened, stopped looking at me, stopped acknowledging me, as if I was even more of a ghost than I already felt I was.

Peter seemed to drift between other friend groups. One day he'll be at the Ravenclaw Table, Next day, at Hufflepuff, Sometimes Gryffindor sitting with Frank or someone else. He'd even been spotted with some Slytherins a few times. Merlin, things have changed.

If you take a look at me from the outside. You would probably say that the Quidditch team has replaced the Marauders for me. I talked to them quite frequently, mostly about Quidditch. Sometimes studying or notes, but it was all fake. No one could tell though. I'm good at putting on that familiar mask of Fine and happy. They all thought that I was doing fine without them. Sure, the occasional odd glance would fall to me in a brief moment of silence when I was reminded of something Sirius had said a lifetime ago. Six days ago.

But if you looked past the surface, past where anyone bothered to look, cared to look I was falling in love with Regulus Black. Every night a new spot, every night I found him. For those mere couple hours, it would just be us, trapped in our own little blissful world of ignorance, ignoring everything around us, ignoring all the problems, ignoring Sirius. It was nice being around someone who also hated him. Or Like Regulus said trying to hate him. Saying it a million times over in your head, looking at it from every angle, yet still, somehow, no matter how furious you are, no matter how angry you were, you can't hate him. Maybe Remus or Peter we're having better luck than us.

The house elves in the kitchens loved Reg. They loved seeing him, their eyes just lit up every lunch period now as they saw him coming in with me. They bombarded him with questions and comments, wanting to show him everything that they were doing, giving him pastries and sweets. He denied most of the offers, but nevertheless he still walked away with at least a week's worth of treats every time. He says he gives them to Pandora and Evan. But still he was just perfect and beautiful. He was just perfect and beautiful. He was a lifeline. He was the light. He was everything's good left.

One night I found him in the art studio. I didn't even know Hogwarts had an arts studio, but of course Regulus would know things like this. I'm assuming that it was on part of the map that Remus plotted. Apparently, Reg was quite the painter, often coming down here to release steam, sometimes with Pandora, sometimes by himself. He enjoyed painting pictures of his cat, Leo, though none of them were finished. I found out that he wrote poetry in the spare time. He never shared any or let me read it though. I found out that he also sketches in a small book that he keeps in his messenger bag. Apparently, Regulus was quite the art enthusiast.