Harry Potter - "Some ways of having loving" - Part 1 - Regulus/Sirius - R
Title: Some ways of having loving.
Part: 1/2
Author: marseverlasting
Fandom: Harry Potter
Pairing: Regulus/Sirius
Rating: R
Warnings: incest, questionable ages, overt sexualization.
Length: 11,983 words.
Archive: For sure. Just leave a comment.
Notes: Written for hp_fairytales. A (vague) retelling of Oscar Wilde's The Birthday of the Infanta.
Summary: On Regulus' birthday, the family gathers. Uncertain boundaries, fiery tempers, and wine thicker than blood.
What is the use of being a boy if you grow up to be a man, what is the use?
- Gertrude Stein
On the ninth day of July, 1974, Sirius draws into his sleeping brother’s room. A sunny Wednesday, as crisp and clear as any boy should want, Sirius crosses the bedroom to stand by Regulus’ side. Mellowed light courses through the cleaved curtains and illuminates the sleeping child’s naked chest and gently-huffing lips, curving the borders of his face in thick, viscous shadow. One sly sixteen-year-old hand slips into the tangles and folds of Regulus’ hair and touches, slightly, the side of his head, tickling behind the boy’s ear. The curve of Regulus’ ribs, feathered in light, notched in grooves perfect for a hand; Sirius’ quick fingers slide into and around, half-embracing the boy, tugging his skin and cupping about his shoulder blade. The motion persists, and short-bitten fingers continue to spread along the arch of his brother’s ear, which makes Regulus shiver and wake, though he stirs only gently.
“Sirius?” Regulus mumbles.
Sirius descends to his knees and puts his mouth near Regulus’ ear and whispers with hot breath: “Happy birthday, brother.”
Sirius’ hair lies in tangles too, like some great weedy mess draped this way and that over his head, mussed from sleep and hanging disheveled about his ears like a Gypsy. He runs a hand through it stupidly before touching this same palm to the flat-boned area at the top of Regulus’ chest, shaking him gently.
“Mm,” Regulus replies, still content to bask in sun-warmed sleep, “thank you.”
“A teenager, aren’t you,” Sirius continues, moving his lips forward to clasp a gentle kiss on his shadow’s earlobe. “Mother has one of the elves making you eggy bread. Get up.”
“Mm,” Regulus replies again, stirring only fractionally, as if nuzzling into Sirius’ pandering lips. “Save me some. I’ll be down later, I’m sleepy now.”
“Come on, Regulus,” Sirius says roughly. “It’s almost one and the relations will be here soon.”
“I told you I’m tired, Sirius,” Regulus replies, though his slowly shifting personage; legs kicking under blankets and chest stretching like a frightened cat; speaks of wakefulness.
Sirius presses another meaningless kiss into the shallow crescent of Regulus’ ear and whispers gently: “Mother will yell at me if you don’t come downstairs this instant, Reg.” A wicked grin ripples inwards from the corners of his lips. “Besides, you wouldn’t want me to wake you.”
“What?” Regulus mumbles, his mind drifting to and fro between that happy place we occupy before sleep and the sudden wakefulness of Sirius’ hot breath and sweaty touch. “Just leave me alone.”
“Well, you leave me no choice,” Sirius says, at last realizing that his gentle methods of persuasion are flawed. And with that, out comes his nimble pink tongue, a sweet thing that draws a cold path along the inside hollow of Regulus’ ear and sends the junior boy screaming and flying, presently flinging himself over the side of the bed to escape the wet of his older brother.
“You foul - that’s disgusting, Sirius!” Regulus wails, only the top of his head and his shadowed glaring eyes appearing over the edge of the mattress. “What the hell was that for?”
Sirius grins. “You wouldn’t have gotten up any other way.”
“Fuck, and on my birthday,” Regulus says, wiping away at his ear with great exaggeration. “That was totally uncalled for.”
Sirius, currently unbuttoning the top two notches of his black Oxford cotton shirt (from heat), gives that seductive kind of smile that makes him the envy of most; a melting look that follows from the nib of his tongue to the very blacks of his eyes, a fertile mask of pleasures and promise. “I thought you like having your ears nibbled.”
“I said romantically,” Regulus says with a touch of a whine. “Not when I’m sleeping. And I don’t want a whole tongue in there either. You’re disgusting and I probably have the plague or something now, don’t I? You’re a disease carrier.”
“Oh, shut up,” Sirius say, rising to his feet. “Now get dressed. Mother says you should wear something nice for breakfast, but you’ll have to change again for this evening, Uncle Cygnus and Aunt Druella are coming for your birthday feast.”
“Aren’t I the little aristocrat?” Regulus adds with a bit of punch, his chin rising in automatic pride. He is immensely pleased with dressing, and he especially likes selecting just the perfect outfit. Small pleasures. “Are you going to help me pick?”
Sirius shrugs. “If you want.”
Regulus rises and, having slept naked, pulls an afghan about his shoulders. His body is defined in Harlequin diamonds of skin; the cream of his collar bone hidden beneath, and the dark curl of hair between his legs covered by wooly white. He stands broad and tall, arching his shoulders back and stretching his tummy, the round of his stomach and lip of his belly button catching the light in muscles and curves.
Sirius withdraws to his brother’ side of the bed and touches Regulus about the shoulders, guiding him to the delicately carved closet doors. Dressed in a latticework of flowers and vines and painted in paisleys and pales, the structure feels remarkably French, like a sampling from the palace of Versailles, an attribute the whole of 12 Grimmauld Place seems to share. Swinging open the doors, a wide array of dress robes, suits, and plainclothes are revealed. Regulus immediately pushes aside the dress robes and starts to leaf through the suits. He selects a grey ensemble, tweed-like, spun all through with browns and dark greens.
“Too miserable, don’t you think?” Sirius asks as Regulus holds it up for his opinion. “It’s your birthday. It’s the middle of summer. Just a button-up shirt should do you well.
In the end, Regulus selects a grey-blue pinstriped button-up shirt and a pair of dark-blue trousers. Sirius, quick to work, tugs the afghan from Regulus’ shoulders and drops the garment to the ground without ceremony.
“What are you doing?” Regulus asks, immediately flushing rose, his hands leaping to cover himself.
“Nothing I haven’t seen, Reg,” Sirius says, bemused. “Besides, you’ve got the loveliest arse I’ve ever laid eyes on.”
“Shut up,” Regulus replies with false-venom, though clearly glowing from the compliment.
Regulus lets his brother dress him, which Sirius does patiently, almost sweetly so; different from his characteristic quality of boyish violence, almost with a touch of fraternity, if not paternity. He begins with the boxers and trousers, which Regulus has the dignity to put on himself. Following this, Sirius guides his brother’s arms through the openings of the shirt and slides the garment over his dusty-freckled shoulders. Regulus smells of sweet milk and dust (the kind of dust that comes with morning, seen drifting like tiny meteors in the bars of sunlight.) Turning the newly-made teenager around, Sirius does the buttons up carefully, biting his tongue like it is some great task of unknowable difficulty; as concentrated as Dickens perched over his parchment, or Einstein in command of a chalkboard. Sirius works through equations of touch and skin, finding all sorts of variables buried within Regulus, things he could never have imaged, answers and questions that can only be posed by the lithe frame of a boy. There exists a universality to the body of a boy: besides the soft nipples and angled bones, there is an unknowable quality of understanding, the skeleton key to so many of life’s questions - the answer to sex and love and fight and why. Sadly, all cleverly hidden within an awkward frame, like a series of foreign hieroglyphics, beautiful to watch, but by the time one can truly admire the shapes and meanings, the Rosetta Stone is already far, far out of reach.
Sirius leaves the top two buttons of Regulus’ shirt cleft, a small-windowed view over the expanse of Regulus’ boyish chest, as blank and bare as a cream canvas, just marred by a dark freckle or two. Tugging at the shoulders of the shirt and flattening down the front of Regulus’ chest and tummy, Sirius smiles in appreciation.
“You look great,” the elder boy remarks. “But mother wouldn’t like this -” He gestures to the tails of the shirt and begins to tuck them into Regulus trousers with practiced ease, a quick hand slide under the waistband, which Regulus immediately halts.
“No, Sirius, come on, I don’t need to be tucked in,” Regulus complains, yanking the shirt from his trousers. “It looks better hanging out.” He steps towards the mirror and admires himself, turning about from angle to angle, approving of his flat stomach and the way his shirt hangs loose from his body, exposing the start of the smooth swell of his shoulders. Regulus runs his hands through his hair a half-dozen times, pushing it away from his face, letting it fall smoothly about his ears.
“You can’t pass a mirror without seducing it, can you?” Sirius asks in mock-exasperation, strangely seeing a lot of himself in the small-framed boy.
“Shut up.” Regulus turns around and admires his arse. “See, it looks better not tucked in. More, um,” he turns and observes the gentle flow of the fabric, like cotton waves, “natural.”
With laughter: “No - more, uh, homeless.”
“Sexy.”
“You just remember that when mother starts yelling.” Sirius cuffs him affectionately on the shoulder. “Now go wash your face and brush your teeth.”
Sirius is sat on the edge of Regulus’ bed by the time the smaller boy returns, grinning widely and smelling of mint and lilac soap. Taking three strong leaps across the room, he lands atop Sirius with a bounce, pushing his older brother to the bed and straddling his stomach in a position of power. Regulus looms over him, pushing shadows over Sirius’ face and laughing mouth. He’s arched like a suspension bridge, tendons all crickling and crackling, new-made muscles of a teenager bulging in his forearms and biting about Sirius’ wrists. He seems a boy of barbed wire, a war-time effort of pushing strength, forced into maturity by bullets and guns (though this time the weapons are family and obligation, two weapons nearly as dangerous.)
“Get off me, you twat,” Sirius says, though his smile belies his words. “You’re fat and you’re crushing me.”
“I’m not fat,” Regulus says sweetly. “I’m beautiful and perfect and you’re just jealous.” He leans forward, almost in a grind, pressing his stomach flat with Sirius’ chest.
Sirius is quick to turn the tables, spinning Regulus to the bed without difficulty. Taking a position over Regulus’ stomach, Sirius pins back his brother’s wrists and leans over him. “Just because it’s your birthday doesn’t mean I can’t beat you up.” He transforms his brother of pubescent wire-and-glue into a laughing and rolling boy of smoothness and softness. This is further accentuated by the boy’s darkened qualities; Regulus’ eyelashes are long and noir foncé and it makes him look wonderfully Arabian, a young sultan amidst his culture, though the refined qualities of his wrists and bones and the sweet pout of his mouth (with the wine-red colour of his lips) hints towards something French, or maybe - from darkness and mystery - Algerian, a fugitive prince or thief or prostitute of some sort.
“Shut up, Sirius,” Regulus replies. “I’m getting taller. I could beat you up soon.”
“You could never beat me up.”
“Why not?”
“Because you’re my little brother, and no matter how big you get, I’ll always be bigger.” Sirius leans down and kisses Regulus at the corner of his mouth before falling into a crushing, aching hug which rolls back and forth over the bed, Sirius on top and Regulus on top, ending how it began, with the bigger boy looming over his little brother, though with something new, a part of the equation not feeling as it did before. Unbalanced.
“See.” Sirius smiles an infectious little thing that warms and glows, and Regulus can’t help but relax into his touch, into the pressing weight of Sirius’ legs and Sirius’ stomach, pressed tightly against his own. “I’ll always be bigger.”
A pause, and then Sirius rolls off his brother, though they continue to lie overlapping, hands and arms and clothes and legs, heat and weight. Regulus is fast to grip Sirius’ hand, entwining their fingers and nuzzling warmly into his shoulder. They both stare silently at the canopy of Regulus’ bed, a cloth and fringed thing that speaks of hundreds of years past. Layered and layered in fabric, the pattern remains sparsely elegant; coils and fringes of solid paisley blue silk spotted with tiny pink and yellow flowers, flowing drapes of the same periwinkle complete with gold cinches as thick as sailing rope. From this blue contraption to the soft sighing breeze ruffling the cloth into action, it feels very much like a boat on the sea. Sky-like sails ruffle in the open white wind, the gentle sway of bodies moving on the mattress in imitation of waves; an easy image the scope of a boy’s imagination might swallow and delight in. They, the brothers, feel suddenly adrift, empty and open in the Aegean: Sirius and Regulus sailing together, Jason and his Argonaut, in made-up Greece of brother-touch and birthdays and white-frosted sweets and Victorian lace.
The walls are papered cream and gold, with curling rhythms made to seem like wrought-copper sconces patterning the walls richly - it soon becomes their sky and the setting sun. Scattered about are tables and chairs, heavily upholstered in complimentary pastels; pink and blue and green, in turns, all of them edged by ruffles and lips of lace (in the constellation of their fantasy, they are sea-foamy islands, neighbouring vessels on the sea).
It feels strange, this archaic comparison, between new-love-brother-love-imagination-thing and this old, stifling Victoria. Vibrancy concealed within dust and mould, immaturity playing on a pitch of ancestry. And when Regulus kisses Sirius’ ear (as sometimes pirates are want to do; he’s read a book about it, he has) the curtains ripple and shudder, the tassels sway and knock on wooden frames, and the cobwebbed chandelier jingles with crystal and cold. It feels like disapproval: the trinkets and deco like the jewelry caught between the breasts of their mother.
The boys soon remove themselves from the bed, and Sirius takes a moment to fix Regulus’ shirt again. Then, with a removed kind of fragility, very apart from his style, Sirius bends down only slightly to kiss his brother on the forehead. Regulus replies by punching him stoutly on the shoulder, which quickly melts into a hand about his waist. And then, without further machinations, Regulus turns and moves and jumps onto Sirius’ back. Laughing brightly, Sirius hooks his arms under the crooks of his brother’s knees and Regulus embraces his brother about the neck, tight. They run laughing from the room, two maniacs (crazy) and two brothers (also crazy) and two pure-bloods (craziest.)
Two-backed figure, hunched and wobbling as if drunk, walks down the stairs. Sirius nearly loses his balance and only Regulus’ hold on the banister keeps them upright. The hallway is a deep and dark place, described more as cavernous than, perhaps, spacious. Shadows, even on this sunny summer day echo into the ciborium ceiling and create sinister pools of veiled spidery corners. Paintings, all the subjects bowed to their knees in respect as Sirius and Regulus fly past, litter the hallway like a patchwork quilt of movement and colour - greys and blues and greens, a palette typical of the Black household. The newest house elf addition, an ugly green unnamed creature, falls prostrate to his knees on seeing his masters come screaming gleefully by.
They hit the landing at the bottom of the stairs where Sirius does a quick jump, hoisting Regulus higher on his back. Regulus kisses him stupidly on the cheek and laughs like the shaking of chimes, holding him tight on the shoulders. They stop for breath only by the door to the dining room (Sirius mostly, as Regulus has only laughed like crazy), a great mahogany piece designed with twin-symbols of the Black household - the greyhound and the snake, looped and intertwined as they are. Sirius nudges the already opened door with his foot and carries Regulus over the threshold to breakfast and mother beyond.
Upon taking their first steps into the dining room, Regulus immediately slides from Sirius’ back and stares in disbelief at the dining room, his eyes shining like wet jewels, smile absolutely beaming. The room is decorated all over in streamers and ribbons, coloured in three shades of green, tied with loops and coils of gold and silver. They fall from the crystal chandelier, crisscrossing to and fro as they drape like a great tent, anchored all in the center of the room. The chamber sparkles with candles and floating copper baubles that gleam with their own light, like tiny little suns. Fairy lights drip from above the picture window, twirling in a helix with the gauzy white curtains, giving a particularly ghostly illusion. In the center of the table is a grand three-leveled cake, iced pure white and decked with thin black tapers standing tall and unlit. The words ‘Happy Birthday’ are written by miniature versions of the copper balls, each no bigger than a cherry, drifting and floating about the room like so many soap bubbles, forming and reforming as they wish. At the head of the table is a plate of eggy toast and a glass filled with orange juice and another with milk. Missing from the picture, like a subject stolen from a portrait, is the imposing figure of their mother: the room is empty.
“Look at this,” Regulus says with incredulity, crossing to the table, looking all about him as the tinny copper bubbles twist and turn before his eyes, forming marvelous sayings like: ‘Sweet Wishes’ and ‘A Day of Joy’ and ‘Bless the Child’. “This is the best mum has ever done,” Regulus says, marveling at the room with such childlike joy.
“Better than she’s ever done for me,” Sirius says a touch heavily, though Regulus takes no notice.
“And, breakfast!” Regulus settles himself at the head of the great rose-wood table, taking hold of his knife and fork, hacking an enormous piece of the eggy bread, glistening all over with sugar crystals and syrup, and shoving it sticky and whole into his mouth.
Sirius contents himself to sit by Regulus’ side, watching him eat, having himself previously dined earlier that morning. “Slow down,” Sirius says automatically as Regulus shoves another whole piece in his mouth. “You’ll make yourself sick.”
“Better to be sick and full,” Regulus says through a mouthful.
Finishing breakfast, Regulus stands and yawns, stretching brightly (he shows a little sliver of skin; the twin ridges of his hips like two gashes in the darkness; the lip of his belly button round and asking to be touched, to let a single finger outline it only briefly before sliding below over the smooth stretch of skin which inevitably leads to the culmination of his thirteen years - Amazing how such a movement, so innocent in action, can immediately fade into the quiet seductions of boyhood, the dark of shadow hiding within it all the philosophies we save for the bedroom.) “Where’s mum?” he finally asks, looking towards the nearest house elf. The elf bows low and says she does not know. Regulus shrugs and takes Sirius by the arm and back into the hall, in search of their mother.
“I’d reckon she would be outside, looking after the feast,” Sirius says smoothly, holding Regulus with one arm about the neck, like a half-hearted chokehold. They immediately set out for the patio, a door connected through the sitting room.
The sitting room is decorated too, though with less fervour than the dining room. Green ribbons fall from the walls like a monochromatic waterfall, twirling and bending as the wind coming through the open porch door buffets them gently. Four large copper baubles stay stationary in the air, though the bright sunlight coursing through the windows renders them useless. The plants in the room are decorated all in gold and silver bows, and vases of white lilies sit on every flat surface, the flowers ripe and open like miniature cups. Regulus pays no attention to the room, presently running through it and out onto the patio.
The boy sprints through the backyard, a grand affair in itself; an acre of carved paths and monumental oak trees and thick, velvet-like hedges. An entirely dichromatic affair of white and green; orchids and pale-coloured roses grow in well-mannered beds throughout, lining paths and growing over trellises and about glass-still ponds. Thick shrubs and hedges surround the flowers with a veritable palette of greens, ranging from the near-yellow of cedar to the vert foncé of holly, highlighted very prettily by the small greenish-white berries typical of the plant. Dominating through it all is the memory of childhood; here is where Regulus threw up after drinking too much wine (Sirius rubbing his back, kissing the back of his neck, telling him it’s all right) and there, where Sirius did a crazy cartwheeling-thing and cracked his knee on one the large rocks in the garden, there where the brothers camped for a night, sharing a sleeping bag and sharing the stars.
Presently, the well manicured lawn is covered all over with tents and canopies of pale green and cream, open mouths showing tables being piled high with food by a veritable platoon of house elves. Trays and trays of food are being delivered; mounds of candied fruit, marzipan sculptures of every size and colour, vast sheets of honeyed baklava, phyllo pastries decorated with spangles of green pistachio, bowls of burnished-gold loukoumas dusted with powdered cinnamon, vast metal dishes of chocolate-covered orange peel, and thick pale green blocks of halva. And those are just the desserts.
Overseeing it all is Mother; Walburga Black. Dressed to fit her name, she’s laced into a painfully anachronistic piece; a black set of lace and pearl that cuts her waist into a tiny circle and raises her powdered breasts to impossible heights. Intricate black needle-work ensconces the structure, dancing along the edges of the fabric like barbed wire. Beautiful cream pearls line the edges of the neckline and shoulders, set up in rows like tiny white soldiers or perfect little baby teeth. Mother’s hair is set in a high, tight bun, run through with two small spikes, resembling too strongly wooden daggers. Her face is stern, with two blots of red make on the tips of each cheekbone giving her the look of either a clown or a cheerful woman; neither of which she is. In stance, hands on her hips, lips pursed into a solid line, she strongly resembles some new image of Maria Theresa; matriarch, domineering, power; veiled and indomitable.
Regulus bounds towards her and jumps into her waiting arms, burying his head into her neck and resting comfortably under her chin.
“Oh, Regulus,” she says, sounding immediately pleased. “Happy birthday, my love.” She sways with him back and forth, and he seems like a pet dog pulled up to its hind legs.
“It’s absolutely perfect, mummy,” he says, at last pulling away, smiling fit to burst, his cheeks adopting a rosy complexion. “It’s positively gorgeous.”
“Oh, but Regulus, look at you, your shirt untucked,” Walburga immediately interrupts, tucking his shirt in quickly. “Sirius, I told you to dress the boy nicely.” She looks across the yard to where Sirius is leaning up against the doorframe, watching the situation with detached amusement.
“I told him to tuck it in,” Sirius replies with forced calmness. “He wouldn’t listen.”
“Don’t lie, Sirius, it’s a terrible habit.” She returns her attention to Regulus, withdrawing a plain white silk handkerchief and wiping at syrup still shiny at the corner of his mouth. “You look dashing, Regulus, your cousins will be so enamored.”
“They’re coming?” Sirius asks, his voice adopting a sour tone.
“Of course they are, Sirius,” Walburga replies, “they always come for Regulus’ birthday. They love their little cousin, don’t they?” She puts a possessive arm about his shoulder and turns to look at Sirius. “You would do well to make nice with them. They are your family.”
“By blood, not by choice.”
“Blood is more important than choice, Sirius, and don’t you forget it.”
Sirius scoffs, and gives Regulus a withering look, though the smaller boy gives no knowledge of having received it.
“In any case, everyone shall be here today. My brothers; Cygnus and Alphard; my sister-in-law Druella, and their three little girls, of course. Even your grandparents Arcturus and Melania will be here! Won’t that be special, Regulus?”
“Grandfather and grandmother are coming?” Regulus says, his expression brightening twofold. “I though they were in France!”
“They’re making a special visit for you,” Walburga croons gently. “You’re becoming a little man today, Regulus. It’s very important.”
“They didn’t come for my thirteenth,” Sirius says blankly.
“Yes, well,” Walburga snaps. “You’re you and Regulus is Regulus, a comparison can hardly be made.” She turns her attention back to Regulus and runs one long-nailed finger over his cheek. “Now, go amuse yourself while mummy finishes up here.”
Regulus smiles and nods and wanders off beyond a small row of hedges, towards the wooden pavilion that lies at the very end of the garden, a vast dark-wood structure covered all over with thick layers of deep green ivy: a calm place, a boy place. He stops short when Walburga speaks, and overhears her speech:
“Sirius,” Walburga beckons. “Come help the elves set up the feast.”
“What?” Sirius replies off hand, having just kicked off his shoes with the intent of joining Regulus in the garden.
“I said, help finish setting up for dinner.”
Sirius pauses, looks at her, searching for any sign of a joke. He glances to Regulus, who smiles at him faintly. “I’d like to spend some time with Regulus, if you don’t mind.”
Walburga turns, and it looks like a machine; a whole series of clicks and gears coming into place, lace ruffling and pearls turning. She seems to move from the waist, like it’s a ball-joint, her upper body shifting while her wide, thick dress stays in place. Her face reddens faintly under the thick-caked white make-up: “You spend too much time with him already. Now, go and help set things up.”
Sirius looks again to Regulus, a look that begs: back me up, would you? Regulus runs a hand through his hair, curling twists of brown behind his ears. His skin seems luminescent; almost surreally beautiful, like a sculpture, a white-boy, a Caravaggio-boy, as full with misplaced holy light as he is with awkward youth. He swallows, and the small stone of his Adam’s apple bobs in his freckle-feathered throat. “I’ll see you later, Sirius.” He sets off to the far end of the garden, his hands balled in his trouser pockets, never turning back again.
Sirius reels; his face grows soft and sad. The sun plays warm on his shoulders and he feels like he’s going to throw up. He grows stifled and ill, constricted by the heat, emblazoned and wrong and lonely. He looks to his Mother, who stares back with all the severity of a sculpture; a Bloody Mary or a Báthory. “I’ll be back in an hour,” she says.
Mother turns away and walks inside the Black manor. Sirius stands in disbelief as the house elves continue, like a line of tiny black ants, to pile food and decoration and plates and shiny silver cutlery on the table. And he feels sweat prickle against the back of his neck; he wipes it angrily and whips it from his hand.
Sirius looks once more towards the house, and back to where Regulus disappeared moments ago. A house elf bows at his feet and whimpers, beckoning him to help, as Mistress said, as Mistress told him. Sirius balls his fists and his fingers dig deep, red crescent-moons into his palm. He bites his lip and he curses. He opens his hand and his chest feels tight. And then. And then he takes off his shirt; and he walks towards the kitchen door, he picks up a tray of food, he walks towards the tents, he puts down the food. And then. He walks back towards the kitchen.
*
Sirius walks into the bathroom, dirty with sweat and work, a single white towel wrapped about his waist. His hair flops about his ears thickly, a tangled mess, and yet, somehow still sweet, still endearing. A dirty quality only a boy could pull off; elegant squalor.
Regulus is in the bathtub, a large ceramic claw-footed basin, when Sirius walks in. Foamy white bubbles froth over the lipped edges of the tub and pool in puddles on the ground. Regulus’ sweet brown hair is plastered black and sleek to his face and a small scoop of bubbles sits atop his head like a petit chapeau. A further tuft of bubble sits at the end of his nose, like a cherry or a white clown nose, and he holds a mound of the sparkling lather in his hands, blowing it and sending spangles of the froth twirling into the air, to float down like so much snow. The tops of his knees poke out from the tub like fleshy islands in a sea of glittering ice, and his freckle-frosted shoulders peek out from above the water, shiny and sleek and full of curved bone and lovely skin. Regulus smiles and blows a clump to Sirius as he enters. “Hallo”
Sirius ignores him and steps to the mirror, withdrawing his toothbrush from the glass by the faucet, which he turns on with unnecessary force.
“Aw, Sirius,” Regulus says, “don’t be angry with me.” He turns in the bath and crosses his arms over the cold edge, resting his chin sadly in the crook between his arms. Tangles and tendrils of wet hair fall over his eyes and stick stupidly to his nose.
“Fuck off, Regulus,” Sirius says sharply, eyeing the boy in the mirror. “I’m trying to get ready.”
Regulus frowns angrily. “Why are you angry at me? I didn’t do anything.” He bites his lip and runs a soapy hand to sweep back his straggling hair. “And it’s my fucking birthday.”
“Don’t you fucking swear,” Sirius says, slamming his toothbrush on the counter and whipping around the look at Regulus. “You left me out to dry, Regulus. You left me in the fucking cold. What were you thinking?”
“What am I supposed to say?” Regulus asks angrily. “She’s our Mother!”
“She’s your mother,” Sirius replies darkly. “I don’t know why I’m surprised, though.” He turns and leans heavily against the edge of the bathroom counter. “You always do this. Everything between us is great and brotherly until mother tells you what to think. And you look at me like I’m a disease.”
“I love you, Sirius. You’re not a disease.” Regulus breathes gently and he blows a little tunnel through the bubbles. “And I love Mother and Father. I mean. I love you all. You’re my blood, and like mummy said, blood is the most important thing.” Regulus looks up through wet-dark lashes and steam. “But I love you the most. You’re mine. You’re my big brother.”
Sirius’ expression softens and he looks like he wants to believe. His whole body, tight muscle and hard, angled bone, seems to drift and wither, like all his energy had been drawn away leaving him empty and pretty, like a ceramic vase. “I want to believe you,” Sirius says, nearly exhausted. “I really do.”
A pause, a breath of steam; soft.
Regulus gets out of the tub. Just like that, steps out of the bathtub, his arched and elegant water-polished body covered in soap suds and wet. He’s, most obviously, naked, and he makes no pretense of covering himself. The top of his chest is burnished red from the heat of the water, and his freckles seem darker because of it, as if he had been spattered with ink. His stomach curves, pushed out by his pose, very much like a child; precocious and open. His hands rest in the twin hollows of his hips, which he tilts to the side, showing the French curve of his calf. His arms and legs are slim and red and the formerly golden hair that feathered his legs is made wet and dark and slick against his skin. His nipples are rosy and soft, like drained blisters, and his lips are in a soft pout, always open like he’s about to speak or kiss.
How often Sirius finds himself observing Regulus’ beauty, pinioned to his brother’s most minute changes in face or feature (the careful tilt of his hip, a slow, shallow blink); how often he is consumed by the vision of his younger self, familiar but forgotten. It’s a constantly changing thing, Regulus’ beauty, and kaleidoscopic in its scope. Right now Regulus is all-American: meaty thighs from soccer, bright eyes set a little too far apart, supple lips (very forbidding, very American), rabbit-teeth a bit too big for his face, clever fingers, and an air of indomitable heterosexuality. On other occasions, the boy has the airs of a Frenchman, made all of wine and arrogance, and occasionally he’s German, brutal and dainty in equal fractions, and on still on others Middle Eastern, hostile and intensely beautiful.
Sirius watches him without an expression, giving almost no reaction whatsoever.
Regulus approaches his brother slowly, small wet feet sliding over cream-coloured tile. The soap soon slides from his body and he is left a wet and shining image of himself, skin gleaming like polished silver and hair wrapped into dark strings and curls - like iconography, an over-sexualized Byzantine Saint (gold, rose, orange.)
One hand slides behind Sirius back and the other about his neck, pulling them close together. Regulus nearly slips - perhaps on purpose, perhaps by accident - and Sirius immediately stretches to embrace him and keep him upright. The boy is an envelope of flesh and bones, thrumming blood and a sex drive that’s fare more advanced than his age. Sirius can feel the heat coming from Regulus, can feel every pulse, every beat of the younger boy’s heart. Their hearts don’t match, though you’d almost expect them to. No, Sirius’ is much faster; the drum pattern between them is out of sync and thumping and filling their ears with non-rhythm. In that moment of irregularity, Regulus leans and kisses his brother. It’s sweet, and bright with fraternity; shared pain and blood and things.
They break soft. Regulus nuzzles into Sirius’ lips and shies away, smiling.
Sirius is rosy, a white stare and blush, and then -- he laughs; he laughs and he hugs Regulus tight and his stomach seems to unknot and his lungs breathe open and his throat doesn’t sting anymore. He holds his naked brother strongly and firmly and he kisses the side of his head.
It feels very much like an extension of himself. Regulus does not begin around the tips of Sirius’ fingers, but rather Regulus exists only through Sirius, their hands blending lines like pools of water, skin continuing into skin. Perhaps it is only a quality of brotherhood, as Remus and James and Peter feel equidistant through touch; very much like boy-on-boy, a knowledge of boundaries. This, though, this exists as fraternity, a sublimation of beings into mixed and mingled minds, where boundaries burn and coalesce as they please, blending two boys into something bigger, more important.
“I wasn’t kidding, Sirius.” Regulus grins. “You’re my brother, you’re mine; of course you mean more to me than anyone else.”
Sirius puts a hand in the dark loops of Regulus’ hair and holds his head against his chest, kissing his crown once more. He smiles and it feels like trust and respect and brotherhood, though maybe just a bit messed up, a bit rattled and uncertain for what it is.
Regulus grins and Sirius feels the movement in his naked chest.
In a moment, Sirius withdraws to the closet and takes out a fluffy cream-coloured towel and sets to work drying his little brother. He takes meticulous care in patting and squeezing Regulus’ hair, slow and steady and talking nonsense as he does. Sirius next combs the brown locks out, curling them, damp, behind Regulus’ wide and blushing ears. A flush creeps into the younger boy’s cheeks, perhaps from the heat of the room, and he stretches and yawns with great ease, very pleased to be treated so well. The skin of his ribs moves like birds taking flight, a soft divergence of shadow, and the small rounds of his nipples match in pink sweetness his now-flushing lips. With towel, his body is now rid of its gleam, settling instead into warm mattes of gold and pink; very much a subject of Picasso’s rose period, a round and warm figure and pleasing to the eye.
Regulus feels a bit feverish to the touch, his body emanating an unnatural heat of its own, but Sirius strikes it down to being a byproduct of the bath. He slides the towel down each of Regulus’ legs, sliding up along his buttocks and following the line of his spine, from smooth divot at the small of his back to the arched angles of his shoulder blades; like little fleshed wings or shallow pyramids.
Sirius turns Regulus to face him and, and with the very corner of the towel wipes at his face, over his cheeks, into the hollows of his eyes, over lips (rough, and making them redder in the process), down to his chin and along the edges of his jaw.
“Hold on a second, I’ll be right back.” Sirius exits the bathroom, treads to Regulus’ bedroom and returns with a pair of black cotton boxers. When he enters the bathroom, Sirius spots his brother examining his face in the mirror, hand on his chin, observing his skin from side to side.
“Here,” Sirius says, offering the boxers. Regulus takes them and, dropping his towel, steps into them, his shame from the morning evidently gone. Sirius watches him warmly, and Regulus seems to revel in his gaze, like an actor in a spotlight, warming and broadening with the attention. Returning to the mirror, Regulus brushes a hand and locks his hair behind his ears.
“Do you shave yet?” Sirius asks off hand.
“No,” Regulus replies, still examining himself. “But I’ve got a bit of fuzz.” He strokes one finger to nonexistent sideburns. “A few scragglies, here.” He beckons Sirius to touch, which his brother does with delicacy.
“Here, let’s sort that out.”
From the silver-mirrored cabinet, Sirius takes out a small onyx-black case, reflective and dark. He pries it open, and removes from it a slender straight-razor, gleaming and new, which he holds daintily in his left hand. Following this, he pulls out a wide cylinder of brown plastic and unscrews the top. Taking out a small rough-bristled brush, shaped like a large make-up brush, he twirls it about in the brown plastic vessel and moves to a comfortable position behind Regulus’ back. Leaning into the boy gently, hot chest slick against Regulus’ sickly hot shoulder blades, he begins to spread the brush about his brother’s jaw. Sirius moves like a dancer, or like the wind; soft, wonderful gestures that spread like the waves, drifting like the strokes of a painter. The brush leaves a milky froth, like the residue of a cappuccino, masking Regulus in what looks like a thin white beard. The younger boy smiles, and tastes the bitter soap of the shaving cream.
Putting the brush down, Sirius tilts Regulus’ chin gently to the side, and holds the straight-razor aloft. Regulus doesn’t flinch as the blade comes down, poised over the warm expanse of his neck. Sirius watches his actions carefully in the mirror as he slides the razor over the boy’s throat, a gentle movement following the curve of his neck, drifting from throat to jaw and leaving a clean line of white skin behind.
It’s amazing, the closeness, the delicacy. With one slice, hot red blood could be spilled; Regulus’ life lies in Sirius’ hands, poised along the too-sharp edge of this blade, a millimeter of thin steel just waiting to bite through skin or an artery.
“You always want to shave towards the chin,” Sirius says softly, so as no to interrupt the hush that had built between the two boys, an envelope of silence that encompasses them like a blanket. “And always gently, and try to do it in one swipe. And never go downwards when you shave your neck,” he continues to explain, “or you’ll get burn. Here - just like this -” The razor moves like a fluid, flowing over the neck as smooth as milk, never biting into the skin, never clearing a red place or drawing blood.
There’s a certain art to the practice. Sirius’ hands move like those of a pianist, fingers sliding along the skin, drawing the razor along like a vapour. He smooths along the length of Regulus’ cheeks, down over his chin, leaving just a residue of froth as he advances. The sharpness of the razor proves itself time and again, but always just shy of hurting the boy.
Sirius, with his free hand, plugs Regulus’ nose, tilting his head upwards as the razor comes in below his nostrils, carving through the froth a clean path towards his lips. This finished, Sirius puts the razor down and contents to hug Regulus, one arm making a lazy front over his brother’s chest, the other caught in younger boy’s damp hair, curling a lock about his finger. Sirius gently kisses the back of his brother’s head.
After a moment Sirius let’s go and steps away from Regulus. “Not bad.” He admires his handiwork, and puts the razor away. “Now, wash your face and go get dressed, I’m going to have a bath.” Regulus nods, and turns the spigots of the sink. “Oh,” Sirius adds, “mother wants you to wear that black suit - you know, with the silver stitching.” And with that, the older brother lets loose his towel and with a flick of his wand, refills the tub with fresh steaming water. He steps in without hesitation, crawls into the bath, and lies back, reddening and sighing with contentment
“Thanks, Sirius,” Regulus says, wiping his face on a hand-towel. He slides a hand over wonderfully smooth skin, like polished marble, and it tingles with sensitivity.
“It’s no problem,” Sirius replies, his eyes closed, the soft sound of waves lapping against his chest. “No problem at all.”
Part 2
Part: 1/2
Author: marseverlasting
Fandom: Harry Potter
Pairing: Regulus/Sirius
Rating: R
Warnings: incest, questionable ages, overt sexualization.
Length: 11,983 words.
Archive: For sure. Just leave a comment.
Notes: Written for hp_fairytales. A (vague) retelling of Oscar Wilde's The Birthday of the Infanta.
Summary: On Regulus' birthday, the family gathers. Uncertain boundaries, fiery tempers, and wine thicker than blood.
What is the use of being a boy if you grow up to be a man, what is the use?
- Gertrude Stein
On the ninth day of July, 1974, Sirius draws into his sleeping brother’s room. A sunny Wednesday, as crisp and clear as any boy should want, Sirius crosses the bedroom to stand by Regulus’ side. Mellowed light courses through the cleaved curtains and illuminates the sleeping child’s naked chest and gently-huffing lips, curving the borders of his face in thick, viscous shadow. One sly sixteen-year-old hand slips into the tangles and folds of Regulus’ hair and touches, slightly, the side of his head, tickling behind the boy’s ear. The curve of Regulus’ ribs, feathered in light, notched in grooves perfect for a hand; Sirius’ quick fingers slide into and around, half-embracing the boy, tugging his skin and cupping about his shoulder blade. The motion persists, and short-bitten fingers continue to spread along the arch of his brother’s ear, which makes Regulus shiver and wake, though he stirs only gently.
“Sirius?” Regulus mumbles.
Sirius descends to his knees and puts his mouth near Regulus’ ear and whispers with hot breath: “Happy birthday, brother.”
Sirius’ hair lies in tangles too, like some great weedy mess draped this way and that over his head, mussed from sleep and hanging disheveled about his ears like a Gypsy. He runs a hand through it stupidly before touching this same palm to the flat-boned area at the top of Regulus’ chest, shaking him gently.
“Mm,” Regulus replies, still content to bask in sun-warmed sleep, “thank you.”
“A teenager, aren’t you,” Sirius continues, moving his lips forward to clasp a gentle kiss on his shadow’s earlobe. “Mother has one of the elves making you eggy bread. Get up.”
“Mm,” Regulus replies again, stirring only fractionally, as if nuzzling into Sirius’ pandering lips. “Save me some. I’ll be down later, I’m sleepy now.”
“Come on, Regulus,” Sirius says roughly. “It’s almost one and the relations will be here soon.”
“I told you I’m tired, Sirius,” Regulus replies, though his slowly shifting personage; legs kicking under blankets and chest stretching like a frightened cat; speaks of wakefulness.
Sirius presses another meaningless kiss into the shallow crescent of Regulus’ ear and whispers gently: “Mother will yell at me if you don’t come downstairs this instant, Reg.” A wicked grin ripples inwards from the corners of his lips. “Besides, you wouldn’t want me to wake you.”
“What?” Regulus mumbles, his mind drifting to and fro between that happy place we occupy before sleep and the sudden wakefulness of Sirius’ hot breath and sweaty touch. “Just leave me alone.”
“Well, you leave me no choice,” Sirius says, at last realizing that his gentle methods of persuasion are flawed. And with that, out comes his nimble pink tongue, a sweet thing that draws a cold path along the inside hollow of Regulus’ ear and sends the junior boy screaming and flying, presently flinging himself over the side of the bed to escape the wet of his older brother.
“You foul - that’s disgusting, Sirius!” Regulus wails, only the top of his head and his shadowed glaring eyes appearing over the edge of the mattress. “What the hell was that for?”
Sirius grins. “You wouldn’t have gotten up any other way.”
“Fuck, and on my birthday,” Regulus says, wiping away at his ear with great exaggeration. “That was totally uncalled for.”
Sirius, currently unbuttoning the top two notches of his black Oxford cotton shirt (from heat), gives that seductive kind of smile that makes him the envy of most; a melting look that follows from the nib of his tongue to the very blacks of his eyes, a fertile mask of pleasures and promise. “I thought you like having your ears nibbled.”
“I said romantically,” Regulus says with a touch of a whine. “Not when I’m sleeping. And I don’t want a whole tongue in there either. You’re disgusting and I probably have the plague or something now, don’t I? You’re a disease carrier.”
“Oh, shut up,” Sirius say, rising to his feet. “Now get dressed. Mother says you should wear something nice for breakfast, but you’ll have to change again for this evening, Uncle Cygnus and Aunt Druella are coming for your birthday feast.”
“Aren’t I the little aristocrat?” Regulus adds with a bit of punch, his chin rising in automatic pride. He is immensely pleased with dressing, and he especially likes selecting just the perfect outfit. Small pleasures. “Are you going to help me pick?”
Sirius shrugs. “If you want.”
Regulus rises and, having slept naked, pulls an afghan about his shoulders. His body is defined in Harlequin diamonds of skin; the cream of his collar bone hidden beneath, and the dark curl of hair between his legs covered by wooly white. He stands broad and tall, arching his shoulders back and stretching his tummy, the round of his stomach and lip of his belly button catching the light in muscles and curves.
Sirius withdraws to his brother’ side of the bed and touches Regulus about the shoulders, guiding him to the delicately carved closet doors. Dressed in a latticework of flowers and vines and painted in paisleys and pales, the structure feels remarkably French, like a sampling from the palace of Versailles, an attribute the whole of 12 Grimmauld Place seems to share. Swinging open the doors, a wide array of dress robes, suits, and plainclothes are revealed. Regulus immediately pushes aside the dress robes and starts to leaf through the suits. He selects a grey ensemble, tweed-like, spun all through with browns and dark greens.
“Too miserable, don’t you think?” Sirius asks as Regulus holds it up for his opinion. “It’s your birthday. It’s the middle of summer. Just a button-up shirt should do you well.
In the end, Regulus selects a grey-blue pinstriped button-up shirt and a pair of dark-blue trousers. Sirius, quick to work, tugs the afghan from Regulus’ shoulders and drops the garment to the ground without ceremony.
“What are you doing?” Regulus asks, immediately flushing rose, his hands leaping to cover himself.
“Nothing I haven’t seen, Reg,” Sirius says, bemused. “Besides, you’ve got the loveliest arse I’ve ever laid eyes on.”
“Shut up,” Regulus replies with false-venom, though clearly glowing from the compliment.
Regulus lets his brother dress him, which Sirius does patiently, almost sweetly so; different from his characteristic quality of boyish violence, almost with a touch of fraternity, if not paternity. He begins with the boxers and trousers, which Regulus has the dignity to put on himself. Following this, Sirius guides his brother’s arms through the openings of the shirt and slides the garment over his dusty-freckled shoulders. Regulus smells of sweet milk and dust (the kind of dust that comes with morning, seen drifting like tiny meteors in the bars of sunlight.) Turning the newly-made teenager around, Sirius does the buttons up carefully, biting his tongue like it is some great task of unknowable difficulty; as concentrated as Dickens perched over his parchment, or Einstein in command of a chalkboard. Sirius works through equations of touch and skin, finding all sorts of variables buried within Regulus, things he could never have imaged, answers and questions that can only be posed by the lithe frame of a boy. There exists a universality to the body of a boy: besides the soft nipples and angled bones, there is an unknowable quality of understanding, the skeleton key to so many of life’s questions - the answer to sex and love and fight and why. Sadly, all cleverly hidden within an awkward frame, like a series of foreign hieroglyphics, beautiful to watch, but by the time one can truly admire the shapes and meanings, the Rosetta Stone is already far, far out of reach.
Sirius leaves the top two buttons of Regulus’ shirt cleft, a small-windowed view over the expanse of Regulus’ boyish chest, as blank and bare as a cream canvas, just marred by a dark freckle or two. Tugging at the shoulders of the shirt and flattening down the front of Regulus’ chest and tummy, Sirius smiles in appreciation.
“You look great,” the elder boy remarks. “But mother wouldn’t like this -” He gestures to the tails of the shirt and begins to tuck them into Regulus trousers with practiced ease, a quick hand slide under the waistband, which Regulus immediately halts.
“No, Sirius, come on, I don’t need to be tucked in,” Regulus complains, yanking the shirt from his trousers. “It looks better hanging out.” He steps towards the mirror and admires himself, turning about from angle to angle, approving of his flat stomach and the way his shirt hangs loose from his body, exposing the start of the smooth swell of his shoulders. Regulus runs his hands through his hair a half-dozen times, pushing it away from his face, letting it fall smoothly about his ears.
“You can’t pass a mirror without seducing it, can you?” Sirius asks in mock-exasperation, strangely seeing a lot of himself in the small-framed boy.
“Shut up.” Regulus turns around and admires his arse. “See, it looks better not tucked in. More, um,” he turns and observes the gentle flow of the fabric, like cotton waves, “natural.”
With laughter: “No - more, uh, homeless.”
“Sexy.”
“You just remember that when mother starts yelling.” Sirius cuffs him affectionately on the shoulder. “Now go wash your face and brush your teeth.”
Sirius is sat on the edge of Regulus’ bed by the time the smaller boy returns, grinning widely and smelling of mint and lilac soap. Taking three strong leaps across the room, he lands atop Sirius with a bounce, pushing his older brother to the bed and straddling his stomach in a position of power. Regulus looms over him, pushing shadows over Sirius’ face and laughing mouth. He’s arched like a suspension bridge, tendons all crickling and crackling, new-made muscles of a teenager bulging in his forearms and biting about Sirius’ wrists. He seems a boy of barbed wire, a war-time effort of pushing strength, forced into maturity by bullets and guns (though this time the weapons are family and obligation, two weapons nearly as dangerous.)
“Get off me, you twat,” Sirius says, though his smile belies his words. “You’re fat and you’re crushing me.”
“I’m not fat,” Regulus says sweetly. “I’m beautiful and perfect and you’re just jealous.” He leans forward, almost in a grind, pressing his stomach flat with Sirius’ chest.
Sirius is quick to turn the tables, spinning Regulus to the bed without difficulty. Taking a position over Regulus’ stomach, Sirius pins back his brother’s wrists and leans over him. “Just because it’s your birthday doesn’t mean I can’t beat you up.” He transforms his brother of pubescent wire-and-glue into a laughing and rolling boy of smoothness and softness. This is further accentuated by the boy’s darkened qualities; Regulus’ eyelashes are long and noir foncé and it makes him look wonderfully Arabian, a young sultan amidst his culture, though the refined qualities of his wrists and bones and the sweet pout of his mouth (with the wine-red colour of his lips) hints towards something French, or maybe - from darkness and mystery - Algerian, a fugitive prince or thief or prostitute of some sort.
“Shut up, Sirius,” Regulus replies. “I’m getting taller. I could beat you up soon.”
“You could never beat me up.”
“Why not?”
“Because you’re my little brother, and no matter how big you get, I’ll always be bigger.” Sirius leans down and kisses Regulus at the corner of his mouth before falling into a crushing, aching hug which rolls back and forth over the bed, Sirius on top and Regulus on top, ending how it began, with the bigger boy looming over his little brother, though with something new, a part of the equation not feeling as it did before. Unbalanced.
“See.” Sirius smiles an infectious little thing that warms and glows, and Regulus can’t help but relax into his touch, into the pressing weight of Sirius’ legs and Sirius’ stomach, pressed tightly against his own. “I’ll always be bigger.”
A pause, and then Sirius rolls off his brother, though they continue to lie overlapping, hands and arms and clothes and legs, heat and weight. Regulus is fast to grip Sirius’ hand, entwining their fingers and nuzzling warmly into his shoulder. They both stare silently at the canopy of Regulus’ bed, a cloth and fringed thing that speaks of hundreds of years past. Layered and layered in fabric, the pattern remains sparsely elegant; coils and fringes of solid paisley blue silk spotted with tiny pink and yellow flowers, flowing drapes of the same periwinkle complete with gold cinches as thick as sailing rope. From this blue contraption to the soft sighing breeze ruffling the cloth into action, it feels very much like a boat on the sea. Sky-like sails ruffle in the open white wind, the gentle sway of bodies moving on the mattress in imitation of waves; an easy image the scope of a boy’s imagination might swallow and delight in. They, the brothers, feel suddenly adrift, empty and open in the Aegean: Sirius and Regulus sailing together, Jason and his Argonaut, in made-up Greece of brother-touch and birthdays and white-frosted sweets and Victorian lace.
The walls are papered cream and gold, with curling rhythms made to seem like wrought-copper sconces patterning the walls richly - it soon becomes their sky and the setting sun. Scattered about are tables and chairs, heavily upholstered in complimentary pastels; pink and blue and green, in turns, all of them edged by ruffles and lips of lace (in the constellation of their fantasy, they are sea-foamy islands, neighbouring vessels on the sea).
It feels strange, this archaic comparison, between new-love-brother-love-imagination-thing and this old, stifling Victoria. Vibrancy concealed within dust and mould, immaturity playing on a pitch of ancestry. And when Regulus kisses Sirius’ ear (as sometimes pirates are want to do; he’s read a book about it, he has) the curtains ripple and shudder, the tassels sway and knock on wooden frames, and the cobwebbed chandelier jingles with crystal and cold. It feels like disapproval: the trinkets and deco like the jewelry caught between the breasts of their mother.
The boys soon remove themselves from the bed, and Sirius takes a moment to fix Regulus’ shirt again. Then, with a removed kind of fragility, very apart from his style, Sirius bends down only slightly to kiss his brother on the forehead. Regulus replies by punching him stoutly on the shoulder, which quickly melts into a hand about his waist. And then, without further machinations, Regulus turns and moves and jumps onto Sirius’ back. Laughing brightly, Sirius hooks his arms under the crooks of his brother’s knees and Regulus embraces his brother about the neck, tight. They run laughing from the room, two maniacs (crazy) and two brothers (also crazy) and two pure-bloods (craziest.)
Two-backed figure, hunched and wobbling as if drunk, walks down the stairs. Sirius nearly loses his balance and only Regulus’ hold on the banister keeps them upright. The hallway is a deep and dark place, described more as cavernous than, perhaps, spacious. Shadows, even on this sunny summer day echo into the ciborium ceiling and create sinister pools of veiled spidery corners. Paintings, all the subjects bowed to their knees in respect as Sirius and Regulus fly past, litter the hallway like a patchwork quilt of movement and colour - greys and blues and greens, a palette typical of the Black household. The newest house elf addition, an ugly green unnamed creature, falls prostrate to his knees on seeing his masters come screaming gleefully by.
They hit the landing at the bottom of the stairs where Sirius does a quick jump, hoisting Regulus higher on his back. Regulus kisses him stupidly on the cheek and laughs like the shaking of chimes, holding him tight on the shoulders. They stop for breath only by the door to the dining room (Sirius mostly, as Regulus has only laughed like crazy), a great mahogany piece designed with twin-symbols of the Black household - the greyhound and the snake, looped and intertwined as they are. Sirius nudges the already opened door with his foot and carries Regulus over the threshold to breakfast and mother beyond.
Upon taking their first steps into the dining room, Regulus immediately slides from Sirius’ back and stares in disbelief at the dining room, his eyes shining like wet jewels, smile absolutely beaming. The room is decorated all over in streamers and ribbons, coloured in three shades of green, tied with loops and coils of gold and silver. They fall from the crystal chandelier, crisscrossing to and fro as they drape like a great tent, anchored all in the center of the room. The chamber sparkles with candles and floating copper baubles that gleam with their own light, like tiny little suns. Fairy lights drip from above the picture window, twirling in a helix with the gauzy white curtains, giving a particularly ghostly illusion. In the center of the table is a grand three-leveled cake, iced pure white and decked with thin black tapers standing tall and unlit. The words ‘Happy Birthday’ are written by miniature versions of the copper balls, each no bigger than a cherry, drifting and floating about the room like so many soap bubbles, forming and reforming as they wish. At the head of the table is a plate of eggy toast and a glass filled with orange juice and another with milk. Missing from the picture, like a subject stolen from a portrait, is the imposing figure of their mother: the room is empty.
“Look at this,” Regulus says with incredulity, crossing to the table, looking all about him as the tinny copper bubbles twist and turn before his eyes, forming marvelous sayings like: ‘Sweet Wishes’ and ‘A Day of Joy’ and ‘Bless the Child’. “This is the best mum has ever done,” Regulus says, marveling at the room with such childlike joy.
“Better than she’s ever done for me,” Sirius says a touch heavily, though Regulus takes no notice.
“And, breakfast!” Regulus settles himself at the head of the great rose-wood table, taking hold of his knife and fork, hacking an enormous piece of the eggy bread, glistening all over with sugar crystals and syrup, and shoving it sticky and whole into his mouth.
Sirius contents himself to sit by Regulus’ side, watching him eat, having himself previously dined earlier that morning. “Slow down,” Sirius says automatically as Regulus shoves another whole piece in his mouth. “You’ll make yourself sick.”
“Better to be sick and full,” Regulus says through a mouthful.
Finishing breakfast, Regulus stands and yawns, stretching brightly (he shows a little sliver of skin; the twin ridges of his hips like two gashes in the darkness; the lip of his belly button round and asking to be touched, to let a single finger outline it only briefly before sliding below over the smooth stretch of skin which inevitably leads to the culmination of his thirteen years - Amazing how such a movement, so innocent in action, can immediately fade into the quiet seductions of boyhood, the dark of shadow hiding within it all the philosophies we save for the bedroom.) “Where’s mum?” he finally asks, looking towards the nearest house elf. The elf bows low and says she does not know. Regulus shrugs and takes Sirius by the arm and back into the hall, in search of their mother.
“I’d reckon she would be outside, looking after the feast,” Sirius says smoothly, holding Regulus with one arm about the neck, like a half-hearted chokehold. They immediately set out for the patio, a door connected through the sitting room.
The sitting room is decorated too, though with less fervour than the dining room. Green ribbons fall from the walls like a monochromatic waterfall, twirling and bending as the wind coming through the open porch door buffets them gently. Four large copper baubles stay stationary in the air, though the bright sunlight coursing through the windows renders them useless. The plants in the room are decorated all in gold and silver bows, and vases of white lilies sit on every flat surface, the flowers ripe and open like miniature cups. Regulus pays no attention to the room, presently running through it and out onto the patio.
The boy sprints through the backyard, a grand affair in itself; an acre of carved paths and monumental oak trees and thick, velvet-like hedges. An entirely dichromatic affair of white and green; orchids and pale-coloured roses grow in well-mannered beds throughout, lining paths and growing over trellises and about glass-still ponds. Thick shrubs and hedges surround the flowers with a veritable palette of greens, ranging from the near-yellow of cedar to the vert foncé of holly, highlighted very prettily by the small greenish-white berries typical of the plant. Dominating through it all is the memory of childhood; here is where Regulus threw up after drinking too much wine (Sirius rubbing his back, kissing the back of his neck, telling him it’s all right) and there, where Sirius did a crazy cartwheeling-thing and cracked his knee on one the large rocks in the garden, there where the brothers camped for a night, sharing a sleeping bag and sharing the stars.
Presently, the well manicured lawn is covered all over with tents and canopies of pale green and cream, open mouths showing tables being piled high with food by a veritable platoon of house elves. Trays and trays of food are being delivered; mounds of candied fruit, marzipan sculptures of every size and colour, vast sheets of honeyed baklava, phyllo pastries decorated with spangles of green pistachio, bowls of burnished-gold loukoumas dusted with powdered cinnamon, vast metal dishes of chocolate-covered orange peel, and thick pale green blocks of halva. And those are just the desserts.
Overseeing it all is Mother; Walburga Black. Dressed to fit her name, she’s laced into a painfully anachronistic piece; a black set of lace and pearl that cuts her waist into a tiny circle and raises her powdered breasts to impossible heights. Intricate black needle-work ensconces the structure, dancing along the edges of the fabric like barbed wire. Beautiful cream pearls line the edges of the neckline and shoulders, set up in rows like tiny white soldiers or perfect little baby teeth. Mother’s hair is set in a high, tight bun, run through with two small spikes, resembling too strongly wooden daggers. Her face is stern, with two blots of red make on the tips of each cheekbone giving her the look of either a clown or a cheerful woman; neither of which she is. In stance, hands on her hips, lips pursed into a solid line, she strongly resembles some new image of Maria Theresa; matriarch, domineering, power; veiled and indomitable.
Regulus bounds towards her and jumps into her waiting arms, burying his head into her neck and resting comfortably under her chin.
“Oh, Regulus,” she says, sounding immediately pleased. “Happy birthday, my love.” She sways with him back and forth, and he seems like a pet dog pulled up to its hind legs.
“It’s absolutely perfect, mummy,” he says, at last pulling away, smiling fit to burst, his cheeks adopting a rosy complexion. “It’s positively gorgeous.”
“Oh, but Regulus, look at you, your shirt untucked,” Walburga immediately interrupts, tucking his shirt in quickly. “Sirius, I told you to dress the boy nicely.” She looks across the yard to where Sirius is leaning up against the doorframe, watching the situation with detached amusement.
“I told him to tuck it in,” Sirius replies with forced calmness. “He wouldn’t listen.”
“Don’t lie, Sirius, it’s a terrible habit.” She returns her attention to Regulus, withdrawing a plain white silk handkerchief and wiping at syrup still shiny at the corner of his mouth. “You look dashing, Regulus, your cousins will be so enamored.”
“They’re coming?” Sirius asks, his voice adopting a sour tone.
“Of course they are, Sirius,” Walburga replies, “they always come for Regulus’ birthday. They love their little cousin, don’t they?” She puts a possessive arm about his shoulder and turns to look at Sirius. “You would do well to make nice with them. They are your family.”
“By blood, not by choice.”
“Blood is more important than choice, Sirius, and don’t you forget it.”
Sirius scoffs, and gives Regulus a withering look, though the smaller boy gives no knowledge of having received it.
“In any case, everyone shall be here today. My brothers; Cygnus and Alphard; my sister-in-law Druella, and their three little girls, of course. Even your grandparents Arcturus and Melania will be here! Won’t that be special, Regulus?”
“Grandfather and grandmother are coming?” Regulus says, his expression brightening twofold. “I though they were in France!”
“They’re making a special visit for you,” Walburga croons gently. “You’re becoming a little man today, Regulus. It’s very important.”
“They didn’t come for my thirteenth,” Sirius says blankly.
“Yes, well,” Walburga snaps. “You’re you and Regulus is Regulus, a comparison can hardly be made.” She turns her attention back to Regulus and runs one long-nailed finger over his cheek. “Now, go amuse yourself while mummy finishes up here.”
Regulus smiles and nods and wanders off beyond a small row of hedges, towards the wooden pavilion that lies at the very end of the garden, a vast dark-wood structure covered all over with thick layers of deep green ivy: a calm place, a boy place. He stops short when Walburga speaks, and overhears her speech:
“Sirius,” Walburga beckons. “Come help the elves set up the feast.”
“What?” Sirius replies off hand, having just kicked off his shoes with the intent of joining Regulus in the garden.
“I said, help finish setting up for dinner.”
Sirius pauses, looks at her, searching for any sign of a joke. He glances to Regulus, who smiles at him faintly. “I’d like to spend some time with Regulus, if you don’t mind.”
Walburga turns, and it looks like a machine; a whole series of clicks and gears coming into place, lace ruffling and pearls turning. She seems to move from the waist, like it’s a ball-joint, her upper body shifting while her wide, thick dress stays in place. Her face reddens faintly under the thick-caked white make-up: “You spend too much time with him already. Now, go and help set things up.”
Sirius looks again to Regulus, a look that begs: back me up, would you? Regulus runs a hand through his hair, curling twists of brown behind his ears. His skin seems luminescent; almost surreally beautiful, like a sculpture, a white-boy, a Caravaggio-boy, as full with misplaced holy light as he is with awkward youth. He swallows, and the small stone of his Adam’s apple bobs in his freckle-feathered throat. “I’ll see you later, Sirius.” He sets off to the far end of the garden, his hands balled in his trouser pockets, never turning back again.
Sirius reels; his face grows soft and sad. The sun plays warm on his shoulders and he feels like he’s going to throw up. He grows stifled and ill, constricted by the heat, emblazoned and wrong and lonely. He looks to his Mother, who stares back with all the severity of a sculpture; a Bloody Mary or a Báthory. “I’ll be back in an hour,” she says.
Mother turns away and walks inside the Black manor. Sirius stands in disbelief as the house elves continue, like a line of tiny black ants, to pile food and decoration and plates and shiny silver cutlery on the table. And he feels sweat prickle against the back of his neck; he wipes it angrily and whips it from his hand.
Sirius looks once more towards the house, and back to where Regulus disappeared moments ago. A house elf bows at his feet and whimpers, beckoning him to help, as Mistress said, as Mistress told him. Sirius balls his fists and his fingers dig deep, red crescent-moons into his palm. He bites his lip and he curses. He opens his hand and his chest feels tight. And then. And then he takes off his shirt; and he walks towards the kitchen door, he picks up a tray of food, he walks towards the tents, he puts down the food. And then. He walks back towards the kitchen.
*
Sirius walks into the bathroom, dirty with sweat and work, a single white towel wrapped about his waist. His hair flops about his ears thickly, a tangled mess, and yet, somehow still sweet, still endearing. A dirty quality only a boy could pull off; elegant squalor.
Regulus is in the bathtub, a large ceramic claw-footed basin, when Sirius walks in. Foamy white bubbles froth over the lipped edges of the tub and pool in puddles on the ground. Regulus’ sweet brown hair is plastered black and sleek to his face and a small scoop of bubbles sits atop his head like a petit chapeau. A further tuft of bubble sits at the end of his nose, like a cherry or a white clown nose, and he holds a mound of the sparkling lather in his hands, blowing it and sending spangles of the froth twirling into the air, to float down like so much snow. The tops of his knees poke out from the tub like fleshy islands in a sea of glittering ice, and his freckle-frosted shoulders peek out from above the water, shiny and sleek and full of curved bone and lovely skin. Regulus smiles and blows a clump to Sirius as he enters. “Hallo”
Sirius ignores him and steps to the mirror, withdrawing his toothbrush from the glass by the faucet, which he turns on with unnecessary force.
“Aw, Sirius,” Regulus says, “don’t be angry with me.” He turns in the bath and crosses his arms over the cold edge, resting his chin sadly in the crook between his arms. Tangles and tendrils of wet hair fall over his eyes and stick stupidly to his nose.
“Fuck off, Regulus,” Sirius says sharply, eyeing the boy in the mirror. “I’m trying to get ready.”
Regulus frowns angrily. “Why are you angry at me? I didn’t do anything.” He bites his lip and runs a soapy hand to sweep back his straggling hair. “And it’s my fucking birthday.”
“Don’t you fucking swear,” Sirius says, slamming his toothbrush on the counter and whipping around the look at Regulus. “You left me out to dry, Regulus. You left me in the fucking cold. What were you thinking?”
“What am I supposed to say?” Regulus asks angrily. “She’s our Mother!”
“She’s your mother,” Sirius replies darkly. “I don’t know why I’m surprised, though.” He turns and leans heavily against the edge of the bathroom counter. “You always do this. Everything between us is great and brotherly until mother tells you what to think. And you look at me like I’m a disease.”
“I love you, Sirius. You’re not a disease.” Regulus breathes gently and he blows a little tunnel through the bubbles. “And I love Mother and Father. I mean. I love you all. You’re my blood, and like mummy said, blood is the most important thing.” Regulus looks up through wet-dark lashes and steam. “But I love you the most. You’re mine. You’re my big brother.”
Sirius’ expression softens and he looks like he wants to believe. His whole body, tight muscle and hard, angled bone, seems to drift and wither, like all his energy had been drawn away leaving him empty and pretty, like a ceramic vase. “I want to believe you,” Sirius says, nearly exhausted. “I really do.”
A pause, a breath of steam; soft.
Regulus gets out of the tub. Just like that, steps out of the bathtub, his arched and elegant water-polished body covered in soap suds and wet. He’s, most obviously, naked, and he makes no pretense of covering himself. The top of his chest is burnished red from the heat of the water, and his freckles seem darker because of it, as if he had been spattered with ink. His stomach curves, pushed out by his pose, very much like a child; precocious and open. His hands rest in the twin hollows of his hips, which he tilts to the side, showing the French curve of his calf. His arms and legs are slim and red and the formerly golden hair that feathered his legs is made wet and dark and slick against his skin. His nipples are rosy and soft, like drained blisters, and his lips are in a soft pout, always open like he’s about to speak or kiss.
How often Sirius finds himself observing Regulus’ beauty, pinioned to his brother’s most minute changes in face or feature (the careful tilt of his hip, a slow, shallow blink); how often he is consumed by the vision of his younger self, familiar but forgotten. It’s a constantly changing thing, Regulus’ beauty, and kaleidoscopic in its scope. Right now Regulus is all-American: meaty thighs from soccer, bright eyes set a little too far apart, supple lips (very forbidding, very American), rabbit-teeth a bit too big for his face, clever fingers, and an air of indomitable heterosexuality. On other occasions, the boy has the airs of a Frenchman, made all of wine and arrogance, and occasionally he’s German, brutal and dainty in equal fractions, and on still on others Middle Eastern, hostile and intensely beautiful.
Sirius watches him without an expression, giving almost no reaction whatsoever.
Regulus approaches his brother slowly, small wet feet sliding over cream-coloured tile. The soap soon slides from his body and he is left a wet and shining image of himself, skin gleaming like polished silver and hair wrapped into dark strings and curls - like iconography, an over-sexualized Byzantine Saint (gold, rose, orange.)
One hand slides behind Sirius back and the other about his neck, pulling them close together. Regulus nearly slips - perhaps on purpose, perhaps by accident - and Sirius immediately stretches to embrace him and keep him upright. The boy is an envelope of flesh and bones, thrumming blood and a sex drive that’s fare more advanced than his age. Sirius can feel the heat coming from Regulus, can feel every pulse, every beat of the younger boy’s heart. Their hearts don’t match, though you’d almost expect them to. No, Sirius’ is much faster; the drum pattern between them is out of sync and thumping and filling their ears with non-rhythm. In that moment of irregularity, Regulus leans and kisses his brother. It’s sweet, and bright with fraternity; shared pain and blood and things.
They break soft. Regulus nuzzles into Sirius’ lips and shies away, smiling.
Sirius is rosy, a white stare and blush, and then -- he laughs; he laughs and he hugs Regulus tight and his stomach seems to unknot and his lungs breathe open and his throat doesn’t sting anymore. He holds his naked brother strongly and firmly and he kisses the side of his head.
It feels very much like an extension of himself. Regulus does not begin around the tips of Sirius’ fingers, but rather Regulus exists only through Sirius, their hands blending lines like pools of water, skin continuing into skin. Perhaps it is only a quality of brotherhood, as Remus and James and Peter feel equidistant through touch; very much like boy-on-boy, a knowledge of boundaries. This, though, this exists as fraternity, a sublimation of beings into mixed and mingled minds, where boundaries burn and coalesce as they please, blending two boys into something bigger, more important.
“I wasn’t kidding, Sirius.” Regulus grins. “You’re my brother, you’re mine; of course you mean more to me than anyone else.”
Sirius puts a hand in the dark loops of Regulus’ hair and holds his head against his chest, kissing his crown once more. He smiles and it feels like trust and respect and brotherhood, though maybe just a bit messed up, a bit rattled and uncertain for what it is.
Regulus grins and Sirius feels the movement in his naked chest.
In a moment, Sirius withdraws to the closet and takes out a fluffy cream-coloured towel and sets to work drying his little brother. He takes meticulous care in patting and squeezing Regulus’ hair, slow and steady and talking nonsense as he does. Sirius next combs the brown locks out, curling them, damp, behind Regulus’ wide and blushing ears. A flush creeps into the younger boy’s cheeks, perhaps from the heat of the room, and he stretches and yawns with great ease, very pleased to be treated so well. The skin of his ribs moves like birds taking flight, a soft divergence of shadow, and the small rounds of his nipples match in pink sweetness his now-flushing lips. With towel, his body is now rid of its gleam, settling instead into warm mattes of gold and pink; very much a subject of Picasso’s rose period, a round and warm figure and pleasing to the eye.
Regulus feels a bit feverish to the touch, his body emanating an unnatural heat of its own, but Sirius strikes it down to being a byproduct of the bath. He slides the towel down each of Regulus’ legs, sliding up along his buttocks and following the line of his spine, from smooth divot at the small of his back to the arched angles of his shoulder blades; like little fleshed wings or shallow pyramids.
Sirius turns Regulus to face him and, and with the very corner of the towel wipes at his face, over his cheeks, into the hollows of his eyes, over lips (rough, and making them redder in the process), down to his chin and along the edges of his jaw.
“Hold on a second, I’ll be right back.” Sirius exits the bathroom, treads to Regulus’ bedroom and returns with a pair of black cotton boxers. When he enters the bathroom, Sirius spots his brother examining his face in the mirror, hand on his chin, observing his skin from side to side.
“Here,” Sirius says, offering the boxers. Regulus takes them and, dropping his towel, steps into them, his shame from the morning evidently gone. Sirius watches him warmly, and Regulus seems to revel in his gaze, like an actor in a spotlight, warming and broadening with the attention. Returning to the mirror, Regulus brushes a hand and locks his hair behind his ears.
“Do you shave yet?” Sirius asks off hand.
“No,” Regulus replies, still examining himself. “But I’ve got a bit of fuzz.” He strokes one finger to nonexistent sideburns. “A few scragglies, here.” He beckons Sirius to touch, which his brother does with delicacy.
“Here, let’s sort that out.”
From the silver-mirrored cabinet, Sirius takes out a small onyx-black case, reflective and dark. He pries it open, and removes from it a slender straight-razor, gleaming and new, which he holds daintily in his left hand. Following this, he pulls out a wide cylinder of brown plastic and unscrews the top. Taking out a small rough-bristled brush, shaped like a large make-up brush, he twirls it about in the brown plastic vessel and moves to a comfortable position behind Regulus’ back. Leaning into the boy gently, hot chest slick against Regulus’ sickly hot shoulder blades, he begins to spread the brush about his brother’s jaw. Sirius moves like a dancer, or like the wind; soft, wonderful gestures that spread like the waves, drifting like the strokes of a painter. The brush leaves a milky froth, like the residue of a cappuccino, masking Regulus in what looks like a thin white beard. The younger boy smiles, and tastes the bitter soap of the shaving cream.
Putting the brush down, Sirius tilts Regulus’ chin gently to the side, and holds the straight-razor aloft. Regulus doesn’t flinch as the blade comes down, poised over the warm expanse of his neck. Sirius watches his actions carefully in the mirror as he slides the razor over the boy’s throat, a gentle movement following the curve of his neck, drifting from throat to jaw and leaving a clean line of white skin behind.
It’s amazing, the closeness, the delicacy. With one slice, hot red blood could be spilled; Regulus’ life lies in Sirius’ hands, poised along the too-sharp edge of this blade, a millimeter of thin steel just waiting to bite through skin or an artery.
“You always want to shave towards the chin,” Sirius says softly, so as no to interrupt the hush that had built between the two boys, an envelope of silence that encompasses them like a blanket. “And always gently, and try to do it in one swipe. And never go downwards when you shave your neck,” he continues to explain, “or you’ll get burn. Here - just like this -” The razor moves like a fluid, flowing over the neck as smooth as milk, never biting into the skin, never clearing a red place or drawing blood.
There’s a certain art to the practice. Sirius’ hands move like those of a pianist, fingers sliding along the skin, drawing the razor along like a vapour. He smooths along the length of Regulus’ cheeks, down over his chin, leaving just a residue of froth as he advances. The sharpness of the razor proves itself time and again, but always just shy of hurting the boy.
Sirius, with his free hand, plugs Regulus’ nose, tilting his head upwards as the razor comes in below his nostrils, carving through the froth a clean path towards his lips. This finished, Sirius puts the razor down and contents to hug Regulus, one arm making a lazy front over his brother’s chest, the other caught in younger boy’s damp hair, curling a lock about his finger. Sirius gently kisses the back of his brother’s head.
After a moment Sirius let’s go and steps away from Regulus. “Not bad.” He admires his handiwork, and puts the razor away. “Now, wash your face and go get dressed, I’m going to have a bath.” Regulus nods, and turns the spigots of the sink. “Oh,” Sirius adds, “mother wants you to wear that black suit - you know, with the silver stitching.” And with that, the older brother lets loose his towel and with a flick of his wand, refills the tub with fresh steaming water. He steps in without hesitation, crawls into the bath, and lies back, reddening and sighing with contentment
“Thanks, Sirius,” Regulus says, wiping his face on a hand-towel. He slides a hand over wonderfully smooth skin, like polished marble, and it tingles with sensitivity.
“It’s no problem,” Sirius replies, his eyes closed, the soft sound of waves lapping against his chest. “No problem at all.”
Part 2