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AUTHOR'S NOTE: I write problematic things. Do not read my fic expecting anything different. I'm not here to describe how people *should* act. You want normative fiction go elsewhere. You have been warned.
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‘Come on, Sev, come here! Stop struggling, it’ll only take a minute!’ he calls, reaching for his friend as the friend in question dodges his grasp and swears at him. Actually catching Sev would be easier if he wasn’t holding the saucer full of lampblack at the same time.
‘I am not letting you put eyeliner on me!’ the other boy snaps, slapping at him.
‘But you’ll look so good,’ he reasons, still trying to grab the other boy, ‘It’ll make your eyes look bigger, and they’re already so huge. It’ll make you look sexy—’
‘I don’t want to look sexy,’ Sev spits, looking like a frazzled cat, right about to claw his face off.
He laughs at the idea, ‘Of course you want to look sexy, everyone wants to look sexy—’
‘You, maybe, but not everyone wants to be gawked at by everyone!’ Sev yelps. Ok, the corner of this private little dressing room he’s summoned in the Room of Requirement is just there, if he can— Nope. Sev’s noticed he’s trying to back him into it and has now drawn his wand.
He raises his hands, holding them out and as open as he can, considering the saucer— in surrender— He’ll try reason. Reason might work. ‘I don’t want to make you sexy for just anyone. Don’t you want Regulus looking at you and thinking fwoah?’ Sev hesitates, he sees it. ‘Come on, Sev, it’s just a bit of soot, perfectly harmless, see—’ he points at his own eyes, already smeared with the lampblack, back before Sev realised he intended to do the same to him as well and got all defensive.
He has a plan. He’s hoping it’s a cunning one. He already got Sev to agree to let him fix up his robes— transfiguration, it had to be, his mother’s cut him off— though he has promised to buy Sev a few pairs to make up for damaged or destroyed ones when they’ve both graduated and he has a job to pay for them. Sev did protest at his rather more adventurous suggestions, and he had wanted to help, not piss his friend off more, so he went along in the end. So, no low-cut fronts, everything all buttoned up under Sev’s chin, but his robes are now a good, rich proper black, the threadbare fabric patched and mended unnoticeably, and everything taken down at the hems and in at the waist so it fits properly and shows off his slender figure. It’s an improvement— even if meant having to endure Sev teasing him about becoming a tailor after school, as he’s done such a good job of it.
He might have also dragged Sev in front of the new mediwitch, Pomfrey, and made such a fuss about how his poor friend couldn’t smell anything properly, and how was such a promising Potions talent to be properly nurtured in the school if the school did nothing about easily fixed physical limitations, and while he wasn’t going to name names— because to do so would to be to name Prongs, and possibly himself— but that students of this very school had contributed to the sorry state of Sev’s poor nose under what was supposed to be the watchful eyes of the staff and how would it look if said staff did nothing to fix the damage? And on and on and on until she agreed to fix Sev’s nose, he thinks, just to get the two of them out of her sight— Or, possibly, she was showing mercy on him, as he suspects Sev had been about to hex him, and hex him badly, for the embarrassment. So, whether or not Sev refused to talk to him for three days, the other boy’s nose is now fixed. It looks very Princely— still big, still aquiline, but straight from the front and no longer looking like it’s been smeared across his cheek.
So, better clothes, fixed the face, apply the eyeliner, then when they all go off to Hogsmeade nudge Sev off in Regulus’ direction and hopes the new and improved slinky, sexy Sev makes his brother get over whatever it is holding him back, and by the end of the day they end up together. It’s obvious they want to be together. It’s kind of— sickening— how into each other they are, but Sev will never make the first move, not after— after all of it— when he expects ridicule every time he shows the slightest vulnerability, and Regulus— He doesn’t know what the problem is there.
He can guess— Their mother, the way they were raised, her criticism of any Pureblood who followed their heart and not their duty, her personal disgust towards homosexuality— unusual, amongst their kind, but not unheard of, for all that it’s embarrassingly probably a view acquired through too much exposure to Muggles and their ways of seeing the world— and Maybe Regulus can’t see how much Sev wants him in return. Regulus is a year younger— not to mention still new to the business of being an Heir, and he was always quiet and the type to keep to himself—
He is sure Regulus does want Sev, though, because when everyone else got back from Christmas break to find this new and improved reality where he and Sev were friends Regulus cornered him in the halls one night, stuck his wand up under his chin, and threatened rather graphically to do him some rather unpleasant harm if he was simply toying with his new friend. He isn’t. Not back then and not now. The more time they spend together the more he likes Sev— to the point he insists on calling him that now, Sev, even though Sev tried to insist on Snape instead, before eventually giving way beneath his persistence.
The fact everyone else is being such a prick about their new friendship is actually helping drive them closer. At first he’d worried he’d respond to Prongs’ thoroughly stated disapproval by withdrawing from Sev— but Prongs and Evans both seem to be teaming up on the anti-Sev bandwagon, and any club that would have Evans as a member is not a club he particularly wants to be a member of himself— other than Dumbledore’s side in the war, of course—
Prongs even had the nerve to corner him too not long after everyone got back and make some noise about how disrespectful of Evans he was being, befriending Sev, and how Sev had called her a Mudblood and blah blah blah— He’d pointed out that dangling Sev upside down and showing all and sundry his pants wasn’t exactly going to put the poor boy in the best kind of mood, and maybe if Evans wanted to be treated with respect she should have shown a bit of blood in defending him, instead of simply whining at Prongs to let him go. A good hex or two would have done wonders for showing Sev she was really on his side— and then he’d got to thinking of how Prongs had then stripped Sev of those pants and showed all and sundry everything there was to see, and that— with the new way he’s trying to look at the world that was pretty dubious.
He hadn’t said that to Prongs. He hadn’t mentioned wondering if Prongs had only done it to see all that everything himself. He doesn’t want to bring Prongs’ mind to the subject of Sev and desire at the same time. He sees those hazel eyes watching his new friend, especially now the nose is fixed, and the robes fit better— It’s so stupid, Prongs watches Sev like he wants to eat him and spits criticism of him at the same time.
Another good thing that will come of Regulus getting with Sev— other than it making his friend happy, and his brother happy, and infuriating his mother— is that it will put an end to any dreams Prongs might be harbouring but not admitting to. Regulus might be new to the business of being a Pureblood Heir, but he’s still a Pureblood, and he’s still— possessive? Is that the right way to put it? He’s the type who, as a kid, wouldn’t necessarily complain out loud when anyone messed with his things, but would hide all his toys, and if anyone got at them anyway and broke something would break something of equal or greater value in return, though never where anyone could catch him. Regulus won’t let Prongs at Sev, once they’re together, and if Prongs presses the issue Regulus will either take him to court— or, if their mother is unlikely to support him in a case— demand a duel. Regulus might even win. Prongs wouldn’t expect that— but he’d bet his brother knows at least half a hundred esoteric curses, charms, and hexes Prongs has never heard of. Regulus always was in the Family library— and spends half his time in the school library.
He’s been debating trying to form some kind of connection with his brother, especially as he’s trying to set up Regulus with Sev. They’ve never been close. Their Family life and differing personalities didn’t make closeness easy— but he doesn’t want Sev having to avoid him to spend time with Regulus, and he also—
Prongs is angry with him. The distance between them seems unsurpassable right now— and Wormy just makes these snippy comments and seems to be laughing at him all the time— and Moony keeps trying to pull him aside and insist he stop with whatever trick he’s trying to pull, that it’s unkind— as if he couldn’t just decide he wanted to be Sev’s friend. As if Sev isn’t worth befriending.
Of course everyone else seems to be following their lead, so he feels a bit like a pariah in Gryffindor right now— not Frank Longbottom, of course, the man’s too decent— but everyone else, and he’s started thinking maybe they never liked him much to begin with, he was just an Heir and Prongs’ best mate— and it makes him remember being a kid, not just— not just the bad bits, but hanging around with Cissa at Family get togethers, everyone hiding from Bellatrix, or even back before Andromeda left— She was always his favourite. She was so much fun. The Blacks tend to be a— hah— grim lot, but not her.
It was thinking of Andromeda— who he really needs to get in touch with again, now he’s also been disowned— that gave him the idea for the lampblack. Bellatrix used to always steal anything good she had— or destroy it— makeup included, so she worked out ways around that, looking in old books for historical makeup tips and probably learning things from other girls in her House. He can remember her getting a saucer, like he did, and a candle, and holding the saucer over the flame to collect the lampblack, the soot, which she’d use with spit and a little brush to line her eyes, or mix with Vaseline to make eyeshadow.
Of course the chances of Sev letting him at him with a brush full of spit and soot were always going to be low, so he’s used water this time.
If only Cissa wasn’t engaged to Malfoy. If only there was a way they could all talk about it, the misery of how they grew up, and what they really want out of life— but it’s so hard.
He’d seen Regulus and Cissa both looking at him with something almost like concern when the first Howler from his mother came, shouting out into the Great Hall what a worthless son he is, and how she’s cut him off, and all the steps she’s taken to make sure he’ll inherit nothing— bestowing so much of it on Regulus instead, now, and not waiting for her and their father to die.
He hopes it comes back and bites her in the arse when Regulus gets with Sev. He hopes Regulus is as strong as he wants him to be. He hopes Regulus doesn’t give way under her wishes.
Sev is still eying him, warily, and he’s about to make another argument for being permitted to actually apply the lampblack— because he knows, he just knows, Sev is going to look amazing. Clean and well dressed and with a fixed nose Sev is already, undeniably, attractive— he’s heard people gossiping about it. Those eyes, though, they’re one of Sev’s best features, they’re not just attractive in a striking way, or exotic way, or severe way— they’re just undeniably, unquestionably beautiful— and then Sev says, all puffed up and defensive, ‘If I look ridiculous I reserve the right to a. remove it and b. hex you, you bastard.’
Oh, he won. He didn’t actually expect to win— or at least not so easily.
‘Well, come over here then,’ he says, making grabby hands. He left the brush and the teacup full of water on the top of the dressing table that materialised with the room. He probably should have left the saucer as well, but he wasn’t thinking.
The very picture of reluctance Sev does so, still looking like he’s about to snap and scratch his eyes out. When Sev does come within reach he— gently— grabs his friend and drags him towards the chair in front of the dressing table, urging him to sit, before sinking down to kneel in front of him, grabbing for the brush before Sev can change his mind.
He wets it, just a little, particles of soot from before escaping to run down into the water as he wipes the excess off on the rim of the cup, before he takes that brush and starts swirling it in some of the lampblack, getting the brush tip nice and coated so he can— ‘Can you relax? Please?’ he wheedles. The way Sev is scowling he doubts he can manage a straight line around his eyes.
His friend blows out an irritated breath, then forces his face into something like smoothness. Carefully, so very carefully, he reaches out and takes Sev’s face, steadying it as he brings over the brush and— and— and— his own tongue poking out between his lips in concentration, breath held, hands as steady as he can make them, and grab more lampblack and move on to the next eye, and—and— and—
There.
He pulls back, Sev blinks his eyes a couple of time, he— he—
‘Oh, wow, you look even better than I thought you would,’ he breathes out. Regulus won’t know what hit him.
‘What do you—?’ Sev begins, sounding offended, like he tends to— the boy’s got the personality of an easily ruffled cat— but then Sev is turning towards the mirror of the dressing table, no doubt expecting to hate how he looks and then give him a bollocking for it, except Sev just— stops. Stops and stares at himself.
He leans in likewise, to get a look at how he looks himself— grey eyes stormy and intense, lined with smudgy black that he thinks sort of makes him look kind of sexy— but nowhere near as sexy as Sev. Which is mildly annoying. ‘You look like you escaped someone’s harem,’ he muses, ‘Your sultan must be kicking himself—’ he cringes moments after saying it, trying not to imagine Evans leaning over him and hissing something about orientalism.
Sev slaps him on the arm, which breaks him out of the potential Evans lecture dread, only to dump him back into it when his friend hisses ‘Don’t be a pig,’ in a very Evansy kind of tone. He reminds himself that they used to be friends, before Evans chucked her snit.
He observes them both in the mirror a moment longer— honestly he feels a little sad. He feels a lot worthless— because looking at Sev like this is enough to confirm for him that Prongs’ eyes will be all over his friend, without lingering on him for one moment— but that’s not Sev’s fault, that’s on Prongs, and Sev doesn’t even want the other guy looking at him, wouldn’t welcome it if he noticed it. It’s kind of funny— for all he and Prongs have called Sev ugly over the years he’s really, really not. In fact he feels kind of ugly next to him right now— but perhaps that’s just because, with everything, his already kind of shit impression of himself is only getting worse.
‘Come on!’ he says after a moment, forcing himself to rally, ‘Let’s go make Regulus’ eyes fall out of his skull—’ he stands, brushes himself off, then glances in the mirror to make sure he looks ok— They’re still in school robes and there are uniform rules that restrict what else you’re allowed to wear with them, so he’s kept the frills at a minimum, and only undone the top three buttons of his shirt, still he looks ok— He glances down at his hands— ‘You sure you don’t want a ring, or something?’ recently he’d decided he likes the way it looks to wear entirely too many of them all at once. It’s flashy and undignified and his mother would have a fit— though, sadly, most of what he is wearing are just transfigured pebbles he found here and there, aside from his signet ring, which he keeps on even after everything as a kind of up yours to his Family. Maybe he should get his ears pierced. ‘Do you think I should get my ears pierced?’
‘No, I don’t want a ring,’ Sev replies to the first question, and then, ‘They’re your ears, Black. Pierce them if you want to.’
‘But do you think I’d look good with pierced ears? I mean, I suppose I could just pierce the one, but then that would be lopsided, wouldn’t it?’
Sev sighs, then fishes in the pocket of his robes to pull out a packet of cigarettes, placing one between his lips and lighting it with a tiny burst of wandless magic, sucking in a lungful of smoke and breathing it out before he says anything. ‘Black, you’re ridiculously handsome, which I think you know already. Pierce your ears, don’t pierce your ears, go around in sackcloth and ashes, it doesn’t matter, you’re still going to be ridiculously handsome.’
His skin prickles. He sees the blush coming up on the pale skin of his face. He’s not got that smooth, perfect ivory of Sev’s skin, instead he’s a bit pinker, he gets the occasional freckle, and tends to go blotchy when he’s feeling emotional. ‘I wouldn’t say ridiculously,’ he says, trying to play it cool, before snatching the cigarette for his own puff.
He hears Sev snort, before the other adds, ‘Come on then, as you said. Let’s get this ridiculous exercise over with— I don’t know why you thought this was a good idea. Potter is just going to scowl at me again, Lils— Lily will ignore me, Pettigrew will make his little comments— and it’s not like either of us have any money, so we’re just going to be hanging around awkwardly while they all go off and spend theirs.’
He shrugs, handing the cigarette back to Sev, ‘Moony’s not exactly loaded, either—’
‘Well, things are hard for werewolves in modern Britain, and for their families—’ Sev mutters. He’s still wary of Moony, but Moony is so God Damned decent that it’s starting to sink in even through Sev’s perfectly understandable caution. ‘There are potions, but they’re expensive, and not all of them work that well.’
It was Moony who suggested they all go to Hogsmeade together this weekend, trying, as always, to mediate between them. By all he meant the Marauders, Evans, and Sev, trying to create some kind of truce, even a tentative friendship— since he is still refusing to give up Sev. Prongs has baulked, Evans had refused, he’d agreed, and then agreed for Sev— who had also baulked and protested and only reluctantly been convinced to go along with it when he pointed out that he’d heard Regulus was also going to Hogsmeade, and then had suggested(lied, kind of) that he wanted a proper chance to talk to his brother away from school and all its connotations— and when Evans and Prongs heard Sev was actually coming they suddenly reversed course, and Wormy— well, Wormy never protested to start with, and, if anything, looks almost amused by it all.
‘But you were talking about that new potion, Wolfsbane?’ Sev does love talking about Potions. He’s actually got a subscription to a couple of the Potions journals, even though— and this is with a student discount— they’re not cheap. Sev makes what little pin money he has by charging other students— mainly Slytherins— to do “research”— A nice way of saying all the study necessary for an assignment, neatly laid out, so all they have to do is write it up in their own handwriting— but not much of it, because he finds it tedious and gets in the way of his own research into whatever he’s interested in at any given moment. Also— Sev’s not great with people he thinks are being unnecessarily stupid.
In the months they’ve been friends he’s watched that little bit of income be used on journal subscriptions, books, notebooks, quills, potions ingredients, and potions equipment, and never, ever, on anything frivolous and fun, other than cigarettes. If he still had the allowance his mother cut him off from he’d take some of it and force his friend to have a good time— after the new robes, new shoes, maybe a bit of jewellery etc. of course.
Sev nods, ‘It really looks promising— but it’s difficult, and even though the ingredients aren’t too shockingly expensive, it’s time consuming and requires a talent beyond most of anyone who will ever graduate from this school to brew it reliably.’
‘Yeah, but you could, couldn’t you? I mean, if we found the money for the ingredients and got you the equipment and everything— Prongs would pay for it, I know he would.’
‘Lily could, as well,’ Sev points out, ‘And I think Prongs would rather it was she and not I that— But, yes, I could brew it, easily, if I had the time, ingredients, and equipment.’
‘Then either you or Evans, we’ll work something out,’ it’s exciting, the thought. A way to make things better for the friend who has had such a hard time of things, and whom he wronged when he tried to feed Sev to him. ‘Prongs can pay for now, but once I’ve gotten a job I can do it. I should do it— and if Moony can have access to that potion every month after school it’ll improve his chances of getting employment, of staying employed, and then he can have a good future, and make it up to his parents for all the— the— the horrible things that have happened since he was bitten. I know he wants to— and it will make everything so much better—’ he reaches for Sev, grabs him, pulls him into an awkward kind of hug that Sev tolerates in his cat-about-to-bite kind of way. ‘Anyway, enough of that! To Hogsmeade— It doesn’t matter if we’re broke, the point is to get Regulus to treat you. He’ll like that.’
‘What about you?’ Sev asks, ‘Or are you intending to attempt to latch on to your brother's largesse as well?’
‘You make me sound like a parasite,’ he pouts, ignoring Sev muttering I make us both sound like a pair of parasites to add, ‘But God no. Reminding Regulus of his older brother’s failures and our mother’s disappointments is hardly going to put him in an amorous mood. No, the plan there is to make Prongs treat me.’
For a moment Sev says nothing, before, hesitantly, ‘Potter seems very preoccupied with Lily. I’m not sure he’s going to—’
‘Then I’ll find some other handsome gentleman to fall for my winsome charms,’ he hopes he sounds light, happy, as if the sting of the thought didn’t land.
For a moment Sev says nothing, face scrunching up, before, ‘Who, though? I guess Lupin— but you said he’s broke too. You’re not going to try and flirt with a Crabbe are you?’
He feels his own face scrunch up, ‘Ew. NO! No— I will flirt with— I will flirt with—’ he thinks, mind quickly going over and discarding the various blokes he knows have some cash to spare, and that he wouldn’t find completely intolerable if they wanted a little something in return for whatever they shell out for him. A kiss maybe— He’s been thinking he might like to try kissing another bloke. Of course he’d love to kiss Prongs, but that’s— that’s probably not on the table, so another bloke. ‘I will flirt with Frank Longbottom,’ he eventually decides. Smart, relatively handsome, not that interesting, but calm and loyal and dutiful. There are much worse blokes out there.
‘Oh, God,’ Sev mutters, ‘Please don’t tell me I have to spend the afternoon watching you flirt with an oblivious Longbottom while that Selwyn girl he’s engaged to either laughs at the pitiful spectacle you make or challenges you to a duel.’
‘She could always join in,’ he replies with a shrug. He thinks he likes girls still— he hasn’t quite been brave enough to examine those feelings too closely. They’re fun to kiss and hang around with, at least, and it’s not like he’s disgusted by them or anything. There are worse places he could end up in than sandwiched between Frank Longbottom and Alice Selwyn.
Sev screws up his nose, blowing a long line of smoke out before asking, ‘Aren’t you related to both of them?’
‘I am related to everyone,’ he replies with a laugh, ‘Or at least everyone Pureblood. You are too. We both are. We all are. We’re all so related— well, maybe not you, as the Prince’s are more careful about that kind of thing— that we don’t really all need separate Family trees. Just one will do. I’m surprised we haven’t all Hapsburged ourselves out of existence.’
‘Maybe that’s why so many of my Housemates are so bloody stupid,’ Sev mutters to himself, before handing back the cigarette. ‘Well, if you want to try kissing your cousins, who am I to stop you? I just think— I just think if you can’t have what you actually want, it’s better not to settle for something you don’t really want instead.’
‘Ah, it’s better than nothing, though, isn’t it?’ he says, trying to smile as he stubs the cigarette out on the saucer, next to the smears of lampblack. Sev rumbled him not long after school started back up. Sev worked out he has feelings for Prongs— and the worst part is how good Sev has been about it all, when he treated the boy so badly in the past. ‘Alright then. Let’s go make my brother see what he’s missing out on!’