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The recurring memory of Lily Evans was one from his penultimate year. He remembered smoking in the astronomy tower, admiring a moonless night. Solitary, surrounded by cobwebs and dust. With his uniform loose and disheveled. In the Slytherin common room, there was a loud, rowdy party, and they were surely serving firewhisky straight from the bottle. A humiliating triumph, everyone was gloating about the victory over the arrogant lions.
Not Barty. And it was strange, because he loved to gloat and be a show-off.
However, he's alone, waiting for a customary, prearranged meeting.
She found him. Barty didn't turn to see her and waited for Lily to approach. Her footsteps echoed against the old wood, and he felt her slide down to sit with him on the window ledge. His feet dangled into the void; hers remained inside the tower.
"Hey, Red."
"Green looks good on you." Barty would never tell anyone that he loved it when the girl's thin, long fingers tangled in his hair, in his bright green dyed mullet. It was relaxing, but he knew that Lily caressed and bit. And he knew it, especially when she grabbed his ear and tugged. His new piercings stung from the squeeze.
"Yeah, I don't know. I copied your style... wearing your house in your hair and all that shit," he said, his cigarette dangling from his lips, and every word came out of his mouth awkwardly. Barty had no qualms, or patience, not to take a long lock of Lily's hair and play with it. He liked the contact, the scent she gave off. Now he understood Severus's obsession with her.
"I thought you'd be celebrating. You guys won the House Cup. You have Gryffindor exactly where you always wanted them."
"It doesn't bother you, from what I can see."
Lily pouted.
"Nope. Although Marlene is angry with Dorcas."
They both laughed. She took his cigarette and took a long drag.
"I thought you'd go and celebrate," he confessed. She shrugged, and Barty noticed how she was embarrassed because Lily crossed her hands in her lap and fidgeted with her fingers.
"I wasn't invited, and I doubt they want me there after... well, you know, Severus."
Barty remembered, of course. The scandal and the accentuated division between the houses after that. The cigarette had already gone out in her fingers. Barty didn't mind. He also wanted to dissolve in Lily Evans's hands.
Three years had passed since then.
Barty still hadn't gotten over the encounter, nor did he accept that Lily had agreed to marry James Potter.
He wasn't angry with her or with him. He wasn't... worried, either. He was a Death Eater.
Barty shouldn't worry, he really didn't, but seeing Regulus and the miserable rat, Peter, made his blood boil more than it should. Regulus was his friend, his brother, but lately seeing him made him feel unprecedented nausea. Barty associated it with the scent that the Black boy gave off, the citrusy but strong perfume that only someone like James "golden balls" Potter could use.
Maybe he discovered it by accident, from a truth collected like pieces of a broken glass. But he did, the clues were there, and Barty... didn't know how to react to them.
He didn't care... he didn't. He swore on his sister that he didn't. But swearing didn't stop the food from climbing up his throat and ending up in vomit. He had to gargle with water and mint to get rid of the sour aftertaste, even if his mouth was burning and the spicy flavor was stinging his tongue. His reflection was that of someone who oscillated between life and death, with dark circles under his eyes from nightmares and disturbed by the situation he found himself in.
Pandora no longer spoke to him, busy forming her family far from problems. Evan was not the most suitable person to consult about the situation, and Regulus IS the reason he's in this state.
Upon seeing him in his room, pretending that nothing was happening, he couldn't stop his mouth from being faster than his head. The words came out jumbled, with a tone that showed his disgust. He had no control, he felt like he would die if he postponed the conversation again. Lily's laughter echoed in his head, scandalous and muffled.
Regulus looked at him, confused.
"Sorry?" he asked, having the audacity to seem nervous. Barty had never... never wanted to punch someone in the nose so badly.
"Are you fucking James Potter?" he repeated, slow and in a low voice, even though they were alone in Barty's temporary dwelling.
A heavy tension settled between them; the room now seemed incredibly small. Barty's eyes didn't stray from Regulus's, his posture straight and uncomfortable against the accusation disguised as a question.
Seeing that his friend said nothing, Barty went crazy... he couldn't hide it anymore.
"You're fucking the damned father of the only thing that can stop you-know-who," he shouted. No one could hear them. He was free to go crazy.
"It's a possibility..." he had the desire to clarify. Barty put his hands to his head and began to pace the room, like a caged animal. Black just stayed close to the wall. He didn't deny it, and for a moment Barty wondered if he hated Peter or his almost-brother more.
He just exploded.
"That's your fucking answer?! Are you kidding me?! He has his damn wife pregnant, and you... you have the audacity to tell me it's 'a possibility'?"
He didn't even know why it bothered him. He hated James, just as he hated Sirius, but he drew a strange line when it came to Lily. Lily, the sharp-tongued girl ready to smash her perfect exams in his face to prove she was better in a class than him. Lily, the cheerful girl who was waiting for a man who was cheating on her with an ally of evil.
Lily Evans, the damned girl who put out his cigarettes in butterbeer while pretending she would smoke with him. Lily "good girl" Evans, the only prefect capable of catching him on his nightly escapades and spending nights talking. Evans, the same woman who made him love red because she had embers in her hair and fire in her heart.
Lily Evans Potter, Mrs. James Potter.
"I don't know why it bothers you," Regulus said, as if it were nothing. He didn't seem to mind being a lover.
"Fuck you, Regs, you're a piece of shit just like your brother."
He stormed out, before giving his friend a chance to lash out at him.
Somewhere else, Sirius sneezed, in the enchanted place where he spent his afternoons and actually a large part of his day-to-day life. His ears burned, though not where his piercings were. It was strange. He brought one of his hands to his neck and looked beyond the grove.
There was something there, watching.
"Is something wrong?" Lily questioned, with the tray of lemonade still in her hands, both of them walking back to the outside patio of the house.
"Nope, nothing at all, m'lady," he said, like an English gentleman of yore.
Sirius flopped dramatically onto the sofa, sliding down the plump cushions until he managed to make Lily laugh. They were on the porch of their new home, with the afternoon sun warming the air. Gatherings had begun to become frequent; the Potter house was full of laughter and afternoons that tasted like blackberry pie and lemonade.
There was no sign of James, which worried Sirius, but he didn't plan to transmit his discomfort to the pregnant woman.
He had a dangerous idea of what he might be doing, but he couldn't verbalize his premonition. It frustrated him greatly; he also couldn't confide in Remus without alerting him, and the last thing he needed was to have a werewolf more anxious than usual roaming around the house.
"Have you talked to your brother?" Lily suddenly asked, pouring a generous amount of lemonade into her glass.
Sirius shook his head; he didn't even remember the last time he spoke to his brother without the phrases "fuck off" and "egotistical pureblood imbecile" in between.
"Nah. Has Petunia told you anything?"
Lily mimicked his movements, although her friend was no longer paying attention to her.
Sirius saw it, beyond the trees... he could detect the damned magical trace that someone who had received the mark emanated... someone who was a Death Eater.
(♡)
Lily woke up alone, in the big bed in her home. The spring breeze broke into her room, and she soon noticed the open window. She swore she had closed it before sleeping, however, she admitted to being forgetful and letting some things slip her mind.
James wasn't there; he had left for an Order meeting. It infuriated Lily that they didn't call her, or Remus, or Alice herself, but she knew that venting to her husband was the worst thing she could do, so she let him go without so much fuss. Inside her, the little baby kicked, warning that something or someone was nearby. The bond pricked inside her, and Lily writhed slightly from the sudden pain. The curve of her stomach, though barely noticeable, weighed her down and plunged her into a state of uncertainty that confused her.
Downstairs, someone was knocking on the door.
Lily was afraid; her wand was burning in her hands, and she reviewed a list of hexes.
She went down the stairs carefully, still in loose sweatpants and a tank top. The door trembled from the furious knocks on the other side. She flinched.
Once in front of the door, she hesitated, reached for the peephole to see who it was, and the result chilled her blood.
Barty Crouch Jr., with his hair messed up and wearing the same stupid leather jacket he wore in his teens.
"Barty?" she whispered, and instantly regretted it because the man's gaze moved towards the peephole, and he put on the most painful and apologetic expression.
"Red? Please open up, I have to talk to you."
The nickname caused a tingling in her stomach. She recognized Barty's tone of a wounded puppy and his melancholic and thoughtful gaze. Even with the years, Barty evoked primary emotions in her.
"No... I can't," she said, though she said it more to herself. She was waiting for James, she was married, and her son was in her womb. And Barty... had disappeared from her life, without a letter or anything more than an eerie silence. She had thought they were friends, a strange couple moved by a slow back-and-forth of flirting and deep conversations at midnight.
"Please, Red, my flower of embers. Open up," he begged. His knocks had subsided, but he spoke as if he were praying. Pleading for her to open the door.
She gave in. She did. She went and opened the door. Barty stumbled upon seeing her, especially when Lily put her wand in his face and made the most threatening face she could. The breeze came in along with the boy, and Lily noticed that his green mullet was almost nonexistent. Barty had both hands raised, and he walked carefully into her house.
"What do you want?" she asked harshly, the words coming from behind her teeth and with her wand still raised. His expression softened, lowering his gaze to look her over completely. She saw him bite his lip, as if enchanted by the sight.
"Damn" she heard him whisper.
"I asked a question," she snapped, dominant. Barty's eyes returned to Lily's green ones. Although they fell again on her rounded belly, which protruded from her shirt.
"I have a couple of things to tell you. But first, I need Sirius Black. This is important for both of you."