#like its the same as james with regulus or lily

[hollowed-theory-hall]

this is probably stupid to ask, but do you like snape? or the marauders? there's always fanwars happening between marauders stans and snape stans. tbh i'm just curious where you stand (i like both, and prefer their canon selves rather than the fanon which is btw really stupid. they feminized sirius so much its not even sirius anymore.) what made you like snape? if you do, or are you neutral with him? just for a change of question since i always ask about harry.

Thanks for the ask! I don't think it's stupid.

I prefer their canon counterparts as well, the Marauders fanon has so little to do with canon I can hardly call the characters by the same name. They just aren't the same characters. Anyway, I'm gonna try and summarise my highly subjective opinions about them here.

1. Sirius Black

He's my second most favorite character and my favorite among the characters you mentioned. I wrote about him a lot on this blog, so I don't really feel the need to write more.

But, he's smart, resilient, and goofy on occasion. His love for Harry is one of my favorite aspects of his character because he loves Harry so much. And he has his flaws. He can be cruel, cold, and arrogant and I wouldn't like him as much if he wasn't visibly a member of The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black regardless of how much he tried to get away from his legacy. I love how messy his feelings about his family are. He left Regulus' room as it was, even though the rest of the house got cleaned by the Order. He stayed in his mother's bedroom even when all the conversations he had with her portrait were in screams. I love his distrust in Dumbledore after everything he's been through and how he chooses to remain for Harry's sake — he's willing to do anything for Harry's sake.

I just truly love Sirius.

2. Severus Snape

He's the next on this list because I do like Snape, he's not a character I'm passionate about, but I like him. I think he shouldn't be a teacher (I think he hates being a teacher more than his students hate him teaching them) but he's a talented potion maker and wizard. And he is a very entertaining character, even without knowing everything about him.

But what really makes me like Snape is that I find him interesting. I think his psychology is interesting, as is his dynamic with Lily, Dumbledore, and Voldemort. Snape is a fascinating character to study from a lot of angles, and even as a reader, there is quite a bit that's up in the air about him because he's that good at being a spy and not giving us anything.

The other major thing I like about him is his competence as a spy and wizard. If there's one thing I love in my fictional characters — it's competence (and intelligence). I often joke with my irl friends that Snape is the only competent Death Eater and the only competent member of the Order of the Phoenix. We then joke that if we were in his shoes, surrounded by a lot of people who don't actually do anything and we're the only ones affecting this war from both sides, we'd probably be bitter too.

A little note that seems overlooked about Snape often in the fandom, in general, is how we think, "Oh, he's so great at Occlumancy and not being emotional" — that's not strictly true. When it comes to Lily or the Marauders all his well-crafted Occlumancy kinda goes out the window. In books 3 and 5 he throws actual temper tantrums about Sirius Black. Like, I feel Snape, deep down is actually super not well adjusted and is an emotionally unstable mess, but he learned to pretend otherwise. Basically, all the cold facade is just that — a facade. He isn't really that stoic.

3. James Potter

I'm weird about James. Like, he's almost a nonentity and what we do hear about him is either negative or comes from biased sources.

I do tend to give him more of the benefit of the doubt than a lot of other fans who prefer canon James do. He was awful when he was younger, he was a bully and he assaulted Snape and there is no excuse for his actions. That being said, I can believe he changed. War changes you and you'd be hard-pressed to find a 21-year-old who isn't ashamed of a lot of what they did or said when they were 15. And yes, some of what James did is definitely more extreme than that of the average person, but it isn't that extreme compared to the environment he grew up in. Remus tells Harry everyone was casting Levicorpous on each other in the halls. I'm not saying any of the bullying is okay, I'm just saying it probably seemed normal to him and this is important context. Same as I don't think Snape is abusive towards students when put in the context of their culture and environment where, until recently, they caned students (Snape actually seems very averse to corporeal punishment. He also likely treats Harry very different than he does literally any other student, but this is the James section).

I just, like the idea of James changing for the better. I'd like to think he did. That life and war and loss taught him something.

4. Peter Pettigrew

Probably an unpopular opinion, but I like Pettigrew more than Lupin. He's awful, he's pathetic, he's a cowardly rat man and I find his sniveling funny. Whenever I try to think of a what-if scenario in my head, Pettigrew is somehow the key to it. Because he's a character that affects so much of the plot in some incredibly crucial moments — he betrayed James and Lily, he resurrected the Dark Lord, and later, he allows Harry's survival. Idk, I just find his situation and just how pathetic he could get fascinating. It's, like, there is no rock bottom for this guy, he keeps digging. Like, you can't get more pathetic than living as a rat for 12 years when you could've moved to Argentina or something.

And at the same time, he clearly has some residual care for Harry for his father's friendship. He has so many opportunities to kill Harry or kidnap him when he runs away to join Voldemort — but he doesn't. Even after Sirius escapes and he knows his time is up, he still leaves Harry alive. When he is supposed to kill him in book 7, he doesn't, he again lets him go and pays with his own life for it. Like, again, idk, it's just how I feel.

5. Remus Lupin

I know I placed Lupin last, and it's because I don't personally like him that much. Pretty sure this is a little controversial, but I don't really like book Lupin, he does not vibe with me, at all. (Though I'd choose book Lupin over Marauders fandom Lupin every time)

Like, it bothers me that he doesn't actually care about Harry (the only one on the list who willingly physically harmed Harry, in a moment of anger, but still). It was Harry who asked to be taught the Patronus, if it was up to Remus, he wouldn't be involved in Harry's life at all. He tried to run on his wife when she got pregnant because he was scared. Like, Petttigrew is given shit for being a cowardly Gryffindor, but, look, you need some guts to betray your friends, so I'd argue Remus is the most cowardly Marauder (it's easy to be brave when you don't care for your own life).

But, all of this is part of his character and the story wouldn't be what it is if Remus bothered to get his head out of his own ass and check up on Harry. How he behaves makes him my personal least favorite Marauder, but I want Lupin to be a cowardly guy who runs away from attachment and responsibility because he doesn't trust himself with anything (especially not anything good). He's not cool, or suave, and he's desperate for people to like him but without actually knowing him because he thinks that if they do they'd run away screaming like he wants to run from himself. Honestly, I don't get why the Mauraders fandom made James the people-pleaser when Remus Lupin is right there always telling people what they want to hear so they'd like him.

Again, these are all my own personal subjective opinions, but yeah.

[childsaturn]

HE is a James potter variant

[ellecdc]

hiya elle!!!

could i request a first-time dad sirius fic of siri introducing his baby to the other marauders?? 🩷🩷

so. stinkin'. cute.

dad!Sirius Black x mom!reader who are introducing their first child to the Marauders

You felt as though you were experiencing the world through glasses that weren’t your exact prescription, riding out the last of the adrenaline coursing through your veins after the past 24 hours. You were floating in this liminal space between discomfort and euphoria, pain and joy, worry and love.

You thought perhaps though the love was beginning to win out.

You were sitting in your hospital bed as you watched Sirius gently bounce the tiny bundle he was holding up to his face.

“Isn’t her nose just perfect, sweets?” He asked you (for quite possibly the 13th time in the four hours your daughter has been earth side) without moving his gaze from said nose.

“So perfect.” You agreed readily, smiling softly at the picture and hoping that this image in your memory didn’t fade as you became more lucid. 

There was a gentle knock before a mop of wild hair and a pair of spectacles shoved its head in through the door to your room.

James gasped quietly yet no less dramatically as he looked between you and Sirius.

“Can we come in?” He whispered, adorning quite possibly one of the biggest smiles you’d even seen on him (which was really saying something, considering he has been notoriously sunny since the day you met him), before Lily shoved her head in just below his. 

“I promise we’ll behave.” She added.

Sirius chuckled and nodded his head in invitation. “You were never the one we were worried about, Red.”

In a way that only happened throughout the history of humanity at the precise moment family members or loved ones entered the room of a newborn and their parents; Lily, James, and Peter all tiptoed in, for some reason even hunching low as if their lack of height would somehow make them any quieter.

James gasped again as he and Lily peered over Sirius’ shoulder to get a glimpse of the newborn in his hands; all three friends sharing identical beaming grins. “She’s beautiful, Sirius.” Lily whispered in awe.

“Bloody perfect, is what she is.” James agreed, leaning around Sirius to look at you. “Way to go, mum. Brilliant job you’ve done.”

“Thank you, Jamie.” You replied, turning a little shy as Sirius turned his lovesick gaze to you, which was very embarrassing considering he literally just watched you push his fucking child out of your crotch. 

“What’s her name?” Peter asked, standing in front of Sirius like an eager kid waiting for their turn to pick a toy from the treasure box.

“This is Aurora Jubilee.” Sirius said proudly, turning his daughter slightly so that Pete could get a look.

“Bloody perfect.” James reiterated when you heard a quiet commotion outside your hospital room.

“I said I was sorry, Reg. The baby can’t tell time yet, she won’t know you’re late!”

You then heard something that sounded an awful lot like someone being whacked with a bouquet of flowers.

“Idiot.” Regulus hissed. “I’m trying to make a good impression; just because you don’t worry whether or not Harry finds his uncle to be untimely doesn’t mean I want to set the same precedent for my niece. Tu as tellement de chance tu es une bonne baise.”

The door pushed open slightly further as Remus and Regulus quietly stepped in, furious blushes adorning their faces when they realised that you all had paused in order to eavesdrop on their conversation.

“How nice of you to finally join us, little brother. Your niece has been asking for you.” Sirius deadpanned. 

Regulus scoffed and Remus grimaced as Regulus came rushing over to your side and pressed a kiss to your hair. “How are you doing, mama?” He asked, pulling back to consider your form as Remus pressed his own kiss to your head. 

“I’m good, uncle Reggie, thank you.” You smiled at him.

“Good.” He said with a curt nod. “I worry, leaving you in the care of my brother - you deserve better.”

“Sod off.” Sirius muttered, causing Lily to gently swat at his back.

“Watch your mouth, Sirius. There are little ears now.”

“Yeah, watch your fucking mouth, Sirius.” Remus volleyed.

“Christ, our kids are doomed.” Lily complained as she moved to sit on the end of your bed.

“Okay, I can’t take it anymore; let me hold her.” James demanded, making grabby hands to Sirius.

“Okay but Prongs, I swear to god if you fumble this like you fum-”

“I didn’t fumble that pass! You threw it too hard!” James quickly negated with a petulant whine.

Moving in slow motion, Sirius relinquished his hold on his new favourite person into James’ capable and seasoned dad hands before moving to perch himself beside you on your bed. 

“‘Lo, Aurora. I’m uncle Prongs; your favourite. I’m going to buy you so many stuffies, your dad and mum will need to buy a second place  just to have somewhere to put them all. And Haz is going to be the best big cousin you could ever ask for; he’s already trying to convince me to buy you a bike so you guys can ride together. And-”

“Okay.” Lily interrupted. “My turn.” 

James harrumphed but acquiesced and passed her over to his wife.

“She has her mummy’s nose.” Lily cooed, causing Sirius to gently pull you into his side and pressing his nose into your hair.

“That’s what I’ve been saying.” He said, causing you to snort.

“No. You just kept saying it was perfect.” You argued.

“Exactly.”

“Let’s just hope you have your mummy’s smarts, too.” Lily concluded, passing Aurora to Pete.

“Oi!” 

“Hi, ‘Ro.” Peter said, smiling down at the infant as she started to stir slightly. “No, no. Please don’t wake up. Oh god, oh god, James take her - take her! I’m not ready for this!”

“Oh hand her ‘ere.” Remus mumbled, moving to take the tiny bundle from his mate. “Wormy smells, doesn’t he, little love?” He cooed at the baby who, much to Peter’s chagrin, stopped fussing immediately. 

“Oh you and I are going to get into so much trouble, darlin’. I’m going to teach you so many swear words, and I’ll help you prank your dad any time you want - you just give me a ring and I’ll be there.”

Any contention between Remus and Regulus from their arrival melted quickly as Regulus leaned into Remus’ side to gaze at the newest Black family member. 

“You wanna hold her, love?” Remus asked him quietly, causing Regulus to shake his head quickly. 

“I don’t want to hurt her.”

Sirius scoffed. “Please, we let Peter hold her.”

“Sod off!”

“What if I drop her?” Regulus continued.

“Just don’t drop her. God, you’re a weird bloke.” Sirius muttered under his breath, though Regulus seemed to catch it as he levelled his brother with a glare. 

His face softened considerably as Remus shifted his hold in order to transfer Aurora into Regulus’ careful arms.

He spent a few moments just looking down at his new niece, a silent conversation seeming to pass between them as Remus reached around him to stroke the downy soft skin on the side of her face.

“Okay, I’ve only known Aurora for three minutes; but if anything ever happened to her, I would kill everyone in this room and then myself.” He said simply. 

Peter let out a nervous laugh before he realised Regulus was quite serious. 

“Good.” Sirius said with a nod. “That’s why we picked you to be her godfather.”

Regulus’ head whipped up at that as he seemed to strengthen his hold on the baby in his arms.

“You what?”

“If anything ever happened to us, we know you’d do everything in your power to give her a good life - the best life.” You explained.

“I- but…really?”

“Yeah.” Sirius said emphatically. “Besides, you inherited all of mother and father’s dirty money anyway, might as well use it to spoil our girl.”

Though there were clearly tears forming in Regulus’ eyes, he turned his attention back to his goddaughter with a derisive scoff. 

“I was planning on doing that anyway, Sirius. Je suis vraiment désolé de te dire ça, Aurora, mais ton père est un idiot.”

Remus snorted. “Already teaching her important life lessons.”

“Get bent, Moony.” Sirius sneered.

[ifyouknowmenahyoudontt]

seeing an #jily in this day and age is genuinely I like finding a single wildflower in a field of plastic roses, its natural beauty standing out against a backdrop of artificial perfection that everyone else adores. why the hell do i have to hear about that weird racist boy all the goddamn time. where is LILY. where is JAMES.who the hell are these PEOPLE. who let THEM IN. who let REGULUS in.why is he ALWAYS HERE.

you should see the way that my smile drops everytime i see the #jegulus at the bottom of a cute thing. or everytime there’s a ship thing and i see james and am like “oh obviously it’s gonna be with lily.HIS WIFE.THE MOTHER OF HIS CHILD.THE WOMAN HE DIED FOR.THAT HE LOVED FOR 7 YEARS.AND THEN FOREVER

and then it’s fucking REGULUS

“he deserves a hug!!” he deserves jail time. and death. he literally contributed to james DYING.

“he’s so traumatized” BY WHOM EXACTLY. did we read the same book. SIRIUS was traumatized.NOT THIS DUMMY

ENOUGH

[in-flvx]

Look... the point of all the "sirius and james are extraordinarily bright" posts is NOT to say that needing or even just WANTING to study between tests is smth that makes remus (the person this usually is about) less intelligent than he actually was, nor to shit on people who do that, or call them dumb.

We know for a fact that sirius considers snape a highly intelligent person. And snape spent most of his time after the dada owl revising. He does make fun of him for the way he writes, but not for the fact that he keeps writing until the papers are collected. He never says a word about remus deciding to study more, other than that it's not his preferred way to spend the time between exams. He regards all of the golden trios comments as equally valuable, even though hermione studies the most, and the others just do it when necessary.

Sirius has a good understanding of the divide between book smarts and street smarts, and he doesn't discriminate. He enjoys the Wensley twins ingenuity, and Harry's joy in quidditch, he regards mundungus fletchers intel as important and dumbledores plans as overall working for the grand scheme. He never shows impatience with remus' way of regarding the world around them (other than when sirius is bored and remus wants him to study with him)

The point of this is never. NEVER. That remus is stupid in any kind of way. Nobody thinks that wanting to study for exams is a sign of stupidity. If that were the case, there would be a large part of the fandom who think of hermione as barely literate or whatever. Bc she studies all the times, as well as between exams. But this is not the case.

The point of the "james and sirius were smart though" posts is this: they became animagi at 15, and helped peter to do the same. They developed the two way mirrors (once again, most accurate and reliable form of long distance communication in the wizarding world) at some point before their last year. They were two of the people who developed the map of hogwarts after all of that. They also were regarded as incredibly bright by Minerva McGonagall (who rarely gives out compliments EVER - even to those she likes, yet she was complimenting sirius at his worst), Flitwick at the same time, snape whenever he went on one of his angry rants about james, hagrid whenever he felt like it, and dumbledore - regularly about james, once about sirius after his death.

So. Again.

The point of these posts is not to be mean to remus for shits and giggles.

It's about the fact that most of marauders art and writing almost compulsively includes lines and comments about sirius and james being stupid. It's about the trend of making james a himbo - to only show his intelligence in some arbitrary grades, if ever, and to make the people around him always commenting on his stupidity.

It's about the fact that all of sirius' accomplishments have to be sourced out to remus. Its about how sirius' general interest in the world at large has to be focused solely to the fact that he wants to fuck remus. Or be fucked by him whatever.

Its about all those stupid ass incorrect quotes that call sirius and james stupid to their faces. It's about all the fics that do the same.

This isn't about the sirius fans calling remus stupid, or showing him in a light that makes him look stupid.

It's about the fact that it's barely possible to find anything about sirius or james in which they aren't explicitly called stupid in the text of the incorrect quote, art, or fic presenting them. Always in service of making remus, lily, and regulus look more intelligent

[conangray-marauders-fest]

Reveals Day 1

Hello, everyone! We are so excited for day 1 of reveals! We are so proud of all of the hard work that the Fest participants have put in! We will be revealing new works each weekday for the next two weeks!

As a reminder, please keep in mind that a lot of Conan's material (and the Marauders Fandom) can be angsty, so please mind all ratings and tags!

I want ya (like everyone else here tonight) - by starsbythepocketfuls

Everyone loves Mary. It’s a fact, anyone who meets her loves her, and the only people who didn’t clearly had issues. So it’s no surprise that Lily’s one of the many. Mary’s just got that gravitational pull, she's impossible to stay away from. It might be a new year, a new party but it’s just the same. Someone asks Mary out, she kindly rejects them, the world keeps spinning. So Lily’s not going to ruing their friendship over something unrequited. She’s not going to sit there and die inside every time someone dances with Mary. She’s not going to do anything. Until she gets really drunk… Mary doesn’t like her back, she can’t, can she?

the day the stars died (and our hearts misaligned) - by saturnitystar

He draws his lower lip between his teeth, still refusing to meet Regulus’ eyes. “You promised. You promised it wouldn’t go this far. You – you said you were okay, that everything was going to be fine but it’s not, it’s not fine anymore.”

“Everything is fine –”

“No, it’s not!” Sirius almost yelled, eyes widening at the way Regulus immediately pulled away to shield himself. He felt as though someone had plunged a knife into him, seeing his younger brother scared and curling in on himself with his eyes squeezed shut – scared of him.

Sirius discovering Regulus’ dark mark, and the conversation that ensues. (inspired by Conan Gray’s “Astronomy” <3)

sleeves - by ilookinpeopleswindows

“Pads!”

Sirius turned around. A football, in all its black and white glory, greeted him with a smack to the face. “Bloody hell, James!” He was going to have a bruise.

(or: severe sirius angst. proceed with caution.)

The Cut That Always Bleeds - by fictional_simp09

Alice struggles being in a secret relationship with Narcissa, especially when she finds out her parents have arranged for her to marry Lucius Malfoy

~ Based on The Cut That Always Bleeds by Conan Gray

Don't leave me hangin' alone again - by 29_AonekoLee

They never bothered to give a name to their relationship; there was a mutual agreement that it was ephemeral, just an interlude. But as they approach the inevitable end, Sirius and Remus try desperately to prolong their time together. [fanart]

Please feel free to reblog, comment, kudos, and otherwise encourage the participants! They worked so hard!

[tiredofthehumanlife]

Realizations

Barbie dolls: Jegulus x gn!reader

Summary: you and James are dating and then Sirius introduces regulus and now you both are crushing

Warnings: James gets called a whore not during sex, James wears crop tops?, Regulus kinda makes James feel bad about his shirt, trans Reggie? Is that a warning?, regulus is strange for sure, mentions of sex and arousal but like its ovulation week so what were you expecting, idk James wears bell bottoms, ITS NOT THAT CRAZY GUYS

Word count: 2.8k-ish

You loved Sirius. He was hilarious, one of the most caring and stylish people you’ve ever met. So when Sirius told you all he was going to properly introduce everyone to his little brother, Regulus, you were excited. When Sirius pulled the boy into the room with all your friends you started to understand why Sirius seemed hesitant at first. First, his brother was a bit of a bitch. Second, fuck he was hot.

You loved James. So much. He was an amazing boyfriend, an amazing person. James was your best friend who you also happened to love fucking. Not the point, point is you felt incredibly guilty finding Regulus attractive. Not only was he Sirius’ little brother, you were sitting in the same room as your boyfriend. You looked to James, you wanted to see his reaction to Regulus calling you all “a bunch of stupid dickheads.” When you looked to him, he was already looking at you. James was sporting your same blush. He mouthed wow before looking back to Sirius. Sirius was telling Regulus to be more friendly. Regulus told Sirius to shove it up his ass. At the mention of Sirius’ ass, Remus was suddenly stuttering over his words. Peter glared at Remus.

“Merlin, try to pull yourself together moony.” Peter muttered. It was funny and you would’ve laughed if you weren’t trying your hardest to not check out your friend’s younger brother in front of your spectacular boyfriend. James had stayed entirely silent this whole time. You stared at him. His eyes were wide, his cheeks were flushed, his lips were tightly pressed together. You knew the look. You’d seen it before, when James met you the first time.

You met Lovely Lily and Ravishing Remus first. You all had a study group together. Though the studying slowly started to decline as you three started gossiping more and more. They started to talk about their ever growing friend group more and more. They decided keeping you to themselves was just plain unfair, so they introduced you to their other friends. Sirius seemed a little mean, glaring at you the whole time Remus and Lily shared your name. The second you complimented his leather jacket, Sirius was beaming. Peter seemed to be ignoring you, fully focused in his homework. The next time you met him, he had no work in front of him. You warmed up to Peter quickly after that. You had first avoided James’ eyes because he seemed to be intimidating. He was just sat there on the ground staring up at you and you thought he was amping up to insult you. When you finally looked at him you realized you have just met a man with absolutely nothing behind his eyes. His jaw was slack and he was just staring up at you. Lily reached out and gently closed James’ jaw for him. He finally sat up straight, greeting you with a large smile. You nodded awkwardly. James pressed his lips together, trying to stop himself from saying something to stupid. His eyes were bugged out and his ears were turning red. Now James was giving Regulus the same look.

You honestly weren’t upset he was into Regulus, because you were too. Clearly, you needed to have a private conversion with James about this later. You did. You both liked him, and now you had to figure out how to handle this. Do you both flirt with your friend’s brother? Do you pretend like nothing is going on? You really didn’t want to scare poor Regulus away. You both knew how hard it must’ve been for him to meet his brother’s friends. It would just be so strange and uncomfortable if half your older brother’s friends started flirting with you the day after you met them. So, you both decided you’d give him time to get comfortable with all of you before either of you said anything to Regulus.

Months later Regulus was like he’d been with you all since day one. He jokingly made fun of everyone, making his own inside jokes with you all, and he’d join in on pranks and plans. Sirius was quite happy he got time to make his bond with Regulus stronger. Remus got another person who loved to gossip. Peter got a friend who loved history as much as he did. Lily got someone to share her younger sibling trauma with. You and James got a lovely friend who was so funny and mean to you both. He hated you guys. You both loved it. You’d throw insults back and forth all the while a grin plastered on your face. Next to you both James would be sat there with his lovesick eyes and soft smile. His eyes bouncing between you both as Regulus threatened to torture you horrifically, only for you to continue flirting with him. James would be grinning brightly, so happy he got to watch the two hottest people in Hogwarts try to kill each other.

When you and James caught a glimpse of Regulus sitting across the Library while on your study date, you turned to each other. You shared a knowing look, closing your books and making your way over to him without a word. The second you slipped into the seat in front of Regulus, he sighed deeply.

“And I thought my day was going well.” Regulus muttered, keeping his eyes on the journal he was scribbling in. James stood next to you, already smiling.

‘Awe come on Reggie, you love us.” You countered, resting your head on your palm. Regulus glanced up at you. Regulus bit onto the end of his fountain pen as he looked over you and James. You dropped your gaze to his lips. The pen pushing down on his bottom lip making it look extra kissable. Your eyes trailed down the pen, seeing his initials engraved with silver.

Sirius gave it to him after he came out. You remember because Sirius came to you with zero context just blurting out ‘how does one love a trans man?’ After a long few minutes of you staring blankly at Sirius, he explained the situation further. You had seen Regulus sitting in various odd positions and places, writing away. You noticed how he had to balance an ink pot in one hand and write with the other, so all you could come up with as a coming out gift was a pen. Although Sirius told you it made Regulus cry and you’ve never seen Regulus without it. You’re glad Sirius got all the credit.

Your gaze followed down to his hand gently holding onto the pen. His rings were always attractive, it wasn’t just you. James thought so too. Regulus kept rubbing his finger over the small ring of silver near the tip of his pen. You shouldn’t have found it hot. It was though. James rested his hand on your shoulder, gently squeezing it to say ‘i know right?’ You met Regulus’ eyes again to see him looking you up and down. His eyes flickered over to gazing over James’ body. James had found the magic of crop tops a few weeks back and now any chance he got his was showing off his happy trail in a shirt with some phrase like ‘I love milfs’ or ‘eat your girl out or I will’. You loved them, you didn’t love all the detentions he got from getting dress coded. You felt it was a fair trade. Regulus’ eyes snagged on his happy trail. Regulus poked the inside of his cheek with his tongue. He suddenly sat up straight and schooled his features, meeting your eyes again. You gave him a knowing smile.

“If you consider wanting to partake in homicide love, then yes. I do.” You smiled at him letting out an awe. You shared a look with James. You reached out, hooking your finger in the belt loop of his bell bottomed pants. You tugged James closer and winked up at him.

“You hear that, Jamie? He loves us. We love you too Reggie.” Regulus rolled his eyes. He turned back to his journal. You leaned over the table, peeking at his writing. Regulus slammed his journal shut. He slowly slid it across the table, hiding it in his lap.

“What are you writing?” You tapped Regulus’ hand on the table. He didn’t move his hand away, nor did he wipe it.

“Is it dirty?” James added in. You both turned to him, giving him a confused look. James look between your faces. He pressed his lips together.

“I’d call you a whore-“ Regulus started.

“Oh please do.” You smirked. Regulus ignored you continuing with his sentence.

“But I think you’d like it too much. Potter have you ever heard of a shirt? You put your arms through it? Covers your torso? Not ringing a bell, or did you leave your brain at home?” James looked down at his shirt, frowning at it. He pulled at the hem.

“What’s wrong with my shirt?” He sounded like a kicked puppy. You quickly reached out, rubbing his thigh.

“Nothing baby it’s so cute.”

“You mean aside from it breaking half of dress code?” Regulus said, talking over you.

“Do you not like my tummy, Reg?” You grimaced turning to James.

“Don’t say tummy.” You and Regulus said, in sync. You glanced over to him. You shared an understanding look before smiling softly at James. His shoulders had slumped a little since the start of the conversation. You stood up. You rubbed your hand up and down James’ arm, kissing his cheek.

“See you later, Regulus.” You whispered, gently tugging your boyfriend away.

“I hope not.”

You and James carried on like usual, following your usual routines and date nights. Only difference was Regulus seemed to appear more and more. You never asked him to join you guys or tell him to meet you, he just kind of showed up. You and James had planned date nights on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Weekends were anybody’s game or makeup time for a missed date but Tuesdays and Thursdays were pretty regular for you two. Date nights meant anything from passing out on the floor of the common room to breaking more rules than you liked to. Though it didn’t seem to matter what you two were doing because Regulus appeared near you. If you were sitting by the Black Lake just to relax in each other’s presence you’d catch a glimpse of Regulus’ hair across the lake. You’d both stand up to wave to him, if he did notice he never waved back. If you were lying in the courtyard napping in the sun, you’d roll over to see Regulus under a tree not far from you. You’d drag James up and lay back down next to Regulus. If you were having a study date in the Library you’d see Regulus walk past with a tall stack of books. You’d pull James up by his arm, following after Regulus. You’d all share the same table with Regulus pretending he didn’t notice either of you. No matter what he was somewhere near you and James. So you’d include him, obviously. It’d be awkward if you didn’t. You started to think that maybe this wasn’t all coincidence when you saw Regulus showed up in the Gryffindor commonroom, hunched over his journal like usual. His shoes were placed on the floor next to the end of the couch. Regulus was sitting to the side his back pressed to the armrest with his knees pulled to his chest.

“Hey Reg, what are you doing here?” You asked. James scoffed behind you. You glanced at him and grimaced, realizing it sounded kinda mean. Regulus looked up from his book, biting the top of his pen again. He raised an eyebrow at you.

“Well fuck you too then.” He muttered. You rolled your eyes, sitting down next to him. Regulus tucked his socked feet under your thigh. You knew he ran cold, you were actually secretly making him a sweater for his birthday. You wouldn’t dare tell him that though because A: it would ruin the surprise and B: he’d get all ‘no you shouldn’t have. I don’t deserve this’. He’s all traumatized like that, so you kept it quiet. Only person who knew was James. James laid down on the couch, dangling his legs over the armrest and throwing his head in your lap.

“I didn’t mean it like that, Regulus. You know I love your company. I was just confused because I don’t think you know the password.” You stared at Regulus, hoping he’d show you somehow that he wasn’t truly hurt by it. Regulus stared at you with his blue eyes. Both of the Black brothers had blue eyes. Sirius’ were a light piercing blue that, upon your first interaction, you thought were freaky. He seemed to peer directly into your soul, seeing everything you were and loving you anyways. Maybe that’s why Remus liked his eyes so much. Regulus’ were a deep blue. When he finally made eye contact with you, you felt like you were getting sucked into the depths of the ocean. His eyes were all consuming. They covered you in him, all you think about when looking into Regulus’ eyes was Regulus. If Sirius’ eyes looked into your soul, Regulus’ showed you his soul. Regulus looked back to his page, making you miss his stare.

“What you guys doing here anyways?” Regulus muttered like it wasn’t your boyfriend’s common room. You slipped your hand behind Regulus’ knee massaging the back of his calf. Regulus didn’t react at all, continuing to scribble away. James tilted his head back, staring at Regulus upside down.

“Date night.” James explained, laying back down. Regulus winced, he looked to you to verify. You nodded.

“Oh wow James you sure are romantic, taking your partner all the way to your common room.” Regulus said. You smiled at him. You patted James’ chest, reminding him he could take you to a landfill and you’d still love him. James sat up.

“Hey we were going to go take a nap. That’s very romantic.” James said. He pointed at Regulus like a scolding mother. You gently pushed James’ finger down. You pecked his cheek.

“Yes you are so romantic James, no need to fist fight Reg.” James glared at Regulus as he laid back down in your lap. You rubbed Regulus’ calf up and down before returning to massaging it. You sat in silence for a few moments. Regulus continued writing away, while James started fiddling with your hand on his chest. You switched calf’s every few minutes, not wanting them to get uneven amounts of attention. You dropped your head back against the couch, closing your eyes. You heard Regulus move next to you. He gently traced the silhouette of your nose. You opened your eyes and stared at him without moving your head. You didn’t want to scare Regulus taking his hands away. Regulus dragged his finger down to your lips. His jaw went slack as he felt your lips against his fingertips. You held your breath as you felt a wave of arousal travel down your spine. His fingers dipped past your chin. Regulus traced down your throat, stopping at your collarbones. He fiddled with your necklace. Regulus moved the little J charm between his fingers. Regulus pulled his eyes away from your necklace to your eyes. You let out a small breath.

“You both ought to go take that nap now. I doubt you want to be spending your date night sat next to your friend’s little brother.” James sat up. His eyes snagged on Regulus’ fingers playing with your necklace. James looked up to you and gave you a smile. You both looked back to Regulus.

“Regulus, baby.” He gave you a confused look. He glanced between you and James. James sucked in a breath.

“We already spend most of our dates with you, so it wouldn’t really be much of a change.” James explained. Regulus removed his hand from you, closing his journal. Regulus stared at his lap for a few minutes, before looking up.

“I do not understand.” You gave him a small smile. You reached out and pushed his hair away from his face. You cupped Regulus’ cheek and rubbed your thumb against his skin. You leaned forward. Regulus fluttered his eyes shut, tilting his face up towards you. You gently kissed his cheek, teetering close to the corner of his lips. You pulled back. Regulus stared at you as you stood up. James quickly pecked Regulus’ other cheek before bounding up the stairs after you.

Regulus was starting to realize certain things about himself.

Part 2 >

[mezsygfs]

Marauders as things my friends have said pt 2

had a deep dive in our discord dms for this shit. @al1xre as promised. love you tater tot 😽🩷 which friend should I target next.. nani or cece.... I got A LOT on both them mfs

other parts

Sirius: BRO. YOU CAN FIGURE THIS OUT URSELF

James: BUT PADS??? YOURE MY EMOTIONAL SUPPORT PERSON?? YOURE SUPPOSED TO HELP??

Dorcas: DUDE. IM NOT GOING TO REPEAT MYSELF.

Barty: YOURE NOT MY MOTHER. but fine.

James: STOP BEING GOOFY AND CONFESS

James: THIS IS STRESSING ME OUT

Sirius: YOU??? MF IM THE ONE IN THE MIDDLE OF THIS?

James: DAWG IM SHITTING BRICKS. WE'RE BASICALLY THE SAME PERSON SO

Peter: BRO JUST LEAVE ME ALONE IF YOU WONT LISTEN

Marlene: NO BUT THAT IS SCARY HUH

Lily: I DONT GIVE A FUCK. SAY IT.

Marlene: I'm telling Pandora you're being mean

Lily: I DONT GIVE FLYING FUCKS IM TRYING TO HELP YOU

Barty: shape one into a dick

Evan: bro there's children around

Dorcas: well she told me her name and I told her mine??

Barty: ... Congratulations?

Evan: hit the jackpot fr

Dorcas: I'm gonna stop talking to you both

Regulus: I love being the unproblematic bystander

Lily: ew I feel like a mother

Marlene: mommy lily

Lily: no pls I hate that

Mary: what about mother Lily?

Peter: I need help with the personality

James: uhmm.. harsh at first? Smoker definitely

Sirius: has a penis

Remus: HAS A PENIS? 😭

James: everythings possible

Dorcas: lesbians liking men

James: oh yeah. That's not possible.

Sirius: why don't you just fall for a friend?

James: eh idk.. most of em are taken

Sirius: wow ok I'm offended

James: don't you like Remus?

Sirius: still.. thought that counts..

Barty: potter doesn't think I'm scary, right?

Regulus: of course not! He thinks you're terrifying!

Remus: my coffee tastes like sad bean water :((

Sirius: put creamer in it

Remus: oh right I forgot

James: I appreciate you sm I love you

Sirius: I love you more??

James: impossible. I love you more.

Sirius: possible. I love you most.

James: I love you mostest.

Sirius: I love you more than mostest.

James: I love you more than more than mostest.

Sirius: that makes no sense what and you're wrong like its not possible

(Remus and Regulus side eyeing the fuck out of them both)

Evan: oh my gosh we both have siblings.. soulmates fr.

Regulus: i wanna be on your level of delusion

Sirius: how bout Remus turns around and looks at ME like that

James: id look at you like that

Sirius: THAT CAUGHT ME OFF GAURD.

Sirius: my life is so boring I need real drama

Peter: id create drama but being involved takes a lot of effort

[adh-james-version]

Why have I been seeing so much Regulus, Barty, Evan, and Jegulus hate? And hate on every James ship that ISNT jily?

To all the older people in the fandom that are hating on the new ships, and characterization: This is NOT the same fandom it was 10 or so years ago!!

#1 - Fandoms evolve!

Everything you don’t like isn’t racist, everything you don’t like isn’t facsist, everything you don’t like isn’t fetishizing, everything you don’t like isn’t misogynistic, everything you don’t like isn’t destroying the fandom, shipping James with someone else isn’t anti-Lily, personality head cannons that don’t perfectly align with yours aren’t gonna bring the fandom to its knees.

Every fandom changes as people leave, join, create, write, draw, etc. So when I started seeing people hate so extremely on certain characters, ships, and headcanons, to the point that they are willing to tell someone to off themselves and/or call people stupid/racist/facsist ect. It took me by surprise because not likening something and talking about it or keeping it to yourself is different than telling someone they are misogynistic for liking a mlm James ship over Jily.

#2 - Hypocrisy Regarding Deatheaters

One thing that I see a lot of is people hating on is the fact that canonical deatheaters like Regulus, Evan, and Barty got revamped or “babygirled”. My first point here is that the same people who believe that are also Pro-Snape. While there is nothing wrong with being Pro-Snape, you can’t be Pro-Snape but Anti-Regulus. Both of them defected from the death eaters! They both laid down their lives to try and help! Even if the impact wasn’t the same the want to be on the right side was. You can definitely not like the personality that a lot of the fandom has given him, but you can’t hate him merely on principle without kinda looking like a hypocrite.

Now onto Evan and Barty: yes they were terrible adults and did horrible things, BUT, we don’t know them as school students. That’s why the fandom took them and fleshed them out how they wanted to, they were a virtually blank slate. That’s why many people like the headcanon of them being forced by their families into getting the mark. We don’t know what truly happened so we took some artistic liberties. Again the same sentiment about Snape from earlier can apply: you can’t hate Evan and Barty on principle when in canon (because most people making this argument care religiously about canon) Snape took the dark mark willingly and again canonically we don’t know why Barty and Evan took the mark.

#3 - The Whole Jily Thing

Okay, look. Liking a James ship that’s not Jily, not a big deal. Liking Jily and not liking other James ships, not a big deal. Not liking any of the James ships, not a big deal. Liking some, one, or none of the first two options, not a big deal. Calling someone misogynistic for liking Jegulus or any other James mlm ship, however, is odd. Saying all people fetishize mlm just because they like an mlm James ship over Jily, is odd. That’s the equivalent of someone who ships Jily over an mlm James ship being called homophobic.

This really ties back to points 1 and 2, the fandom evolved and more ships were added. And calling someone a misogynist for not shipping Jily but shipping Jegulus or another mlm ship when in reality they could be the biggest feminist on the planet but just not a Jily shipper.

#4 - Personally

They’re ships, characters, and headcanons that I really don’t like/hate but you don’t see me saying that the ship is going to end the fandom or that it is fetishizing the characters?

For example, I don’t like Snape (as a person, no knock to his his accomplishments) AT ALL, but I don’t think the people who do are racist! I don’t really like the trans ftm Remus headcannon, but I don’t think all the people who do are fetishizing the trans community. I like the Mary x Pandora x Lily ship but I don’t think the people who don’t are anti polyamory!

#5 - Conclusion

Older members of the fandom and people who have been in the fandom a long time really need to calm down a little bit.

And for the people who say things along the lines of “what about canon” and “it can’t severely affect canon”

The EXISTENCE of this fandom goes against canon! You ship wolfstar and nobleflower but you “care about canon”?!?

Okay that’s it.

[mistress-violence]

Prompt: Lipstick from @into-the-jeggyverse (August 26)

Word count: 740 words

Pairing: Jegulus (modern AU)

⚠️ Warnings: alcohol consumtion, gender identity issues

Regulus finally managed to get out of the argument about what kind of cheese was the best, which started a whole fight between Sirius and Dorcas, with Remus, James, and Peter as collateral victims. He was out of the madness until they started throwing wine at each other like last time and staining his white shirt again. He walked out of the kitchen of the apartment he shared with James, wanting to go to the balcony to get some air. Instead, he found Marlene, Lily, and Pandora in the living room, on the couch, passing a mirror back and forth and talking about something. Pandora was the first to notice him, and she greeted him with a big smile.

"What are you doing here?" Regulus asked, sitting down in one of the armchairs.

"Marlene brought a whole box of lipsticks from Paris!" Lily said excitedly, pointing to the black round box on the table. "It’s Chanel, can you believe it?".

Lily had a deep red lipstick in her hand, an extremely alluring and elegant shade. For a few seconds, Regulus had been absolutely spellbound. It was beautiful. The shape reminded him of his mother's expensive lipsticks, but she always preferred dark and sober colors. When he was little, Regulus would go to Walburga's room to watch her do her beauty routine, but he would immediately be kicked out. "Boys don't need to concern themselves with women's business," was what he was told before he was sent to his father's office to learn how to be "a proper gentleman." Marlene, with an enviable tenacity, immediately noticed the twinkle in the boy's eyes.

"Do you want to try one too, Regulus?" she asked, but she didn't wait for an answer but directly handed him a small rectangular box.

Regulus hesitated at first, but curiosity tingled through his body. Pandora gave him the mirror, and Lily showed him how to use it. Regulus gulped. He didn't know why he was so nervous; maybe it was because he could hear Walburga's voice in his head again, telling him to stop with this nonsense. Swallowing hard, he opened the lid, rolled off the lipstick, and revealed an even more intense shade of red than Lily's. His hand was shaking slightly, but he placed the mirror in front of him and carefully applied a layer to each of his lips before pressing and rubbing them together.

An even stranger feeling crept up inside him as he looked in the mirror. It was something hard to explain, but it felt warm and nice, like it was meant to be. The girls complimented the perfect color match with his pale skin and his glossy black hair, but the boy couldn't really hear anything around him. He just wanted to touch that reflection a little, to feel its closeness as if it were another human in front of him, not himself. It had been James' voice that had woken him from his reverie.

"Reg, honey, I don't know where I put the corkscrew for..." James said as he was walking into the living room, stopping in mid-sentence when he got a better look at his partner. "Oh, wow... I see I'm interrupting. Sorry, it's just... this shade really suits you well."

Regulus lost himself again, looking James straight in the eyes. He didn't seem disgusted that he, a man, was wearing something so feminine. His chest filled with heat again. Would he have reacted the same if Regulus grew his hair longer as he had wanted for some time? Or if he would wear that skirt he bought a long time ago and kept hidden in the back of the closet, fearing that someone would find out about it? Regulus took a napkin from the table and hastily wiped his lips.

"We were just fooling a little," he said, getting up from the armchair while wiping the last traces of red. "The corkscrew is in the top drawer; I'll go get it."

Regulus wanted to hand the lipstick back to Marlene, but she waved her hand in the air, insisting on keeping it.

"It catches you better than me, Reg; just take the bloody lipstick," she said with a knowing smile on her face.

Regulus gave her a confused look but chose to just nod and put the lipstick in his pocket, thanking Marlene for the gift before heading back into the kitchen to look for the missing corkscrew.

P.S: This microfic is inspired by my experience as a genderfluid person. Everyone's journey in discovering their own gender identity is different and unique. You can read this how you want. Just remember to love yourself even if you don't feel like you don't belong anywhere.

[tea-blankets-andstars]

Marauders era doing the candy trauma dump trend

inspired by this post

Sirius: Hi im Siri. My parents disoned me and I brought jelly beans

Barty: Howdy party peeps im Barty. My father tortured me and hates me and i brought Lemon heads

Remus: Hi im Remus. When i was younger i was bitten by a werewolf and now every month im locked inside a room and i brought Hershey's kisses 

Lily: Hi im Lily. My sister hates me because i go to hogwarts which made my parents treat me better. I brought saltwater taffy

Regulus: Hello im Regulus and when my brother got disoned i was forced to join a racist terrorist group and i brought York peppermint patties

Pandora: Hiii im Pans. My parents neglected me and my brother Evan and then tried to marry me off to a gay guy. I brought Almond joy

Evan: Hey im Evan. Ya same as pans...Oh and then they also made me join the terrorist group. I brought strawberry gummies

Dorcas: Hi 'm Cas. My parents are irresponsible so i have to take care of my 6 younger siblings. anyways I brought penut brittle

Peter: Hi im Pete i joined the terrorist group and i brought Sour patch kids

Marlene: Heyyyyy im Mars. Everyone underestimates me because im a woman. I brought Crabby patty gummies 

James: Hiii im James. My family took in Siri when they got disoned and im really glad he's safe but at the same time i wish it never had to happen because i feel like i lost part of my childhood and now i feel like i always have to be happy so people will like me and im a massive people pleaser. Anyways I brought Reese's cups

Emmeline: Im Emmeline and when i was Five my mom put me in an orphanage because she didnt want me any more, but i was adopted by muggles so its fine. I brought Werthers caramels 

Mary: Hi im Mary. Im a black woman in the 70s do i need to say more? I brought peach rings 

[solarspringg]

Random Marauders Headcanons :3

• Sirius has awful hearing. If you want to talk to him, you have either be super close to him or yell super fucking loud. His hearing is ruined from constantly blasting his music at such a high volume. James is always telling him to turn the volume down and that he needs some kind of hearing aid (half jokingingly). However, Sirius claims his hearing is perfect, but that’s the biggest lie ever.

• James runs hot. Like it’s actually insane how he’s always hot. It will be the middle of winter and he will be complaining that he’s warm while in a t-shirt and shorts. When he’s back at home he’s constantly adjusting the thermostat (his parents hate it) and brings a fan with him to school every year.

• Remus loves listening to people talk, especially Sirius. After a long day Sirius will rant to Remus and go into full on detail, and he will just sit there and listen until Sirius is done and then offer his commentary. He loves it when his friends will have full on conversations that’ll last hours and he’s just listening, smiling about how absurd their topic of discussion is, because you know it always is.

• Peter is an amazing cook and baker. When it came to the other Marauder’s birthdays, he was always in charge of making the cake, and the cake was always so damn good. He is an absolute genius in the kitchen and if you give him a recipe, he’ll make it ten times better.

• Lily hates contemporary romance novels. Absolutely loathes them. She complains that it’s always the same plot and most of the time, the writing is uninspired, lazy, and boring. She prefers classics, biographies, non-fiction, and poetry. Her favorite book of all time is Little Women.

• Mary is extremely passionate makeup. She has a blog about it and everything; from posting her makeup looks, to providing tips, to even writing essays about the history of makeup products and its usage. She does her makeup everyday because she thinks it’s so fun to get ready and try out new looks.

• Marlene can’t dance. Seriously, she’s has the worst rhythm in the world, but she will dance whenever she can. There’s nothing she loves more than to dance at parties and events because it makes her so ecstatic, and she could not give a single fuck as to what anyone thinks of her or her dancing.

• Dorcas is extremely allergic to animals, especially cats. Whenever there is a cat in the area she’s constantly sneezing and her eyes water a lot. One time Evan and Barty took a stray cat in and hid it in their dorm for months. Dorcas’ allergies went crazy and she finally hit her breaking point and screamed at the top of her lungs: “WHERE IS THE FUCKING CAT?!”

• Pandora loves arts and crafts. When it comes to gifts, they’re always homemade and made with an extreme amount of care. She will make cards, jewelry, sweaters, anything. You name it, she’ll make it. She loves scrapbooking as well— She’ll spend months creating books of memories for the people she cares about.

• Regulus is a restless sleeper. It used to be really bad when he was younger. He has an extensive routine he has to follow before bed in order to actually sleep throughout the night, which consists of sleepy time tea, reading, and even yoga (recommended by Pandora and they even do it together sometimes). If he doesn’t follow that routine, he’s up all night tossing and turning.

• Barty cheats at every game he plays. Cards? He either counting them or hiding them anywhere he can. Anything having to do with fake money? He’s stealing money when no one is looking. Literally any game he’s cheating. He’s not even that competitive, most of the time he doesn’t care if he wins, he just doesn’t want to lose.

• Evan is obsessed with anything that has to do with needles and sharp objects. He loves getting piercings and tattoos as well as watching others get them because he thinks the process is cool. He also really loves knives and has a huge collection of them, having knives from practically all over the world.

[noblehouseofgay]

Amortentia

Jegulus/Black Brothers microfic

Mostly fluff for once <3

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*

"Aw come on, what's it smell like, Reggie?" Ever since potions ended for the day, James has been asking Reg the same question. What does his Amortentia smell like.

"None of your business." "What's going on?" Oh great. His brother. Sirius slung his arms over both boys' shoulders, shoving in between them.

"Well I'm t r y i n g to get Baby Black to spill what his potion smells like, but he won't budge."

"Don't call me that."

Sirius laughs a bit. "Aw does Reggie have a secret crush?" Regulus' cheeks flushed. "Fuck off." He shoved Sirius arm off him. "At least tell me, I'm your brother."

Although he knew better, the petty stubborn part of him won. He looked his brother in the eyes. "Ton meilleur ami (your best friend)."

Sirius' eyes widened. Regulus bit his tongue, not knowing what to expect from his brother.

Sirius just stared at him for a minute. "I- you-" he huffed and stomped off. Regulus' mouth went dry. He expected his brother to not be happy, but he didn't expect angry. He stared off, in a daze.

James frantically looked back and forth between where Sirius went and Regulus. "I'll- I'll go talk to him, I'm sure it'll be ok." He began to leave but Regulus stopped him. "No....I'll speak with him."

He walked down the hallway, messing with his sleeve. Eventually he came across his brother standing against a wall outside.

He tried to control his shaky breaths. "I wasn't going to do anything about it..."

Sirius sighed. "James though? Really? My best friend."

"It's not like I can control it, Sirius..." He sighed. "Look. I know he deserves better than me. I wasn't ever going to tell him or do anything about it....so if that's what you're worried about, then stop it. James will go on blissfully ignorant, never knowing of my pathetic feelings." His voice had bite in it, his attempt to disguise the way his heart ached.

Sirius was quiet. Which would usually be cause for celebration, but right now it just hurt. Deep down he always knew James was Sirius' preferred brother, but he didn't think Sirius would be mad at him for this. How could he be mad? Sirius should be happy that Regulus appreciates James so much. And he should be happy that Regulus won't act on it. He won't get in anyone's way. He can bury his feelings. James can have Lily and he'll let the world keep turning the way its supposed to while he sits the bench.

Sirius broke the silence "I'm not...mad." He couldn't have said that sooner? Saved regulus some panic? "I just don't want either of you hurt." Oh.

"I wouldn't hurt him. Not if I can help it." Sirius looked at him. "I don't want you hurt either, Reg..."

Regulus rolled his eyes. "Sirius, please. This is James we're talking about, he wouldn't hurt anyone, let alone his best friend's little brother."

"Maybe not on purpose, but if he doesn't return your feelings..."

"We don't need to worry about that. I'm not telling him." "You can't be serious." "Of course not, I'd never want to be you."

Sirius rolled his eyes. "You're really not going to tell him?" His expression softened a little.

Regulus looked at his feet. "No."

It was quiet for a minute. "Can I ask why?" Sirius sounded softer than he'd heard him in a long time. It was almost nice, if only it hadn't been about this.

Regulus hesitated. "Whether he...returns my feelings or not, I don't want to hold him back." He hated admitting these things out loud. "He can do better than me. And he should...do better than me. I don't deserve him."

"Regulus-" "No, Sirius. You of all people should understand I'm not good enough. I'm sarcastic. I'm rude. He thrives in the sunlight, and I am nothing but darkness. I'm in the house you've both hated since year one. I am everything you all should despise." He didn't mean to say so much, but it all just flowed out. He couldn't control it once he started. His eyes stung a little. He looked away.

He's happy his brother talks to him again. He missed him. Of course he missed him. But there will always be part of him that feels he doesn't belong with his brother and his friends. He had always felt like an outsider. Maybe he should've stayed an outsider rather than pushing his way in.

Sirius looked at him with sad eyes. "I don't despise you.....I never have." Part of Regulus knew that was true, but there would always be a voice that told him otherwise. "James should be lucky...that you care for him so much, Reg. I know it's hard for you.....to have feelings like this....he'd be lucky."

"He wants Lily, not me." Regulus couldn't look at his brother anymore. He didn't want his brother to put ideas in his head. Regulus knew it could never work, he didn't want Sirius even entertaining the idea. "He likes Lily and she likes him. They'd be good together." He paused. His voice got quieter. "And all I want James to be happy..."

Even if he couldn't have him in this life or the next. He wanted James to be happy. Just like he'd always wanted Sirius happy, whether he was involved or not.

Sirius was looking off somewhere. He was thinking. "Whatever you're thinking, stop it." "I just think maybe we could find out for sure who he likes." "Sirius he doesn't like me that way." "He could. You don't know he doesn't." "Sirius- I am not doing this! I won't give myself false hope!" "Reg, I don't think it's false hope, I really think he could like you."

Regulus was quiet. He knew they were both too stubborn to give in, but just this once he would. Whether it was for selfish reasons or not, nobody would know. "Don't be obvious about it. Whatever you're going to do- don't be obvious. I'll kill you if he finds out not on my terms."

"All we have to do is find out what h i s potion smelled like. He asked you, we'll just say you'll tell him if he tells you."

It wasn't a bad plan. It was simple, and regulus could just lie if needed. "Fine."

So back to James they went. "Are you two ok?" His eyes were so concerned, he really cared about them both didn't he?

"We're all good, prongs. Though, before we left, you wanted to know what Reggie's potion smelled like. But I want to know what yours smelled like. Think it's a fair trade right?"

"Oh-" James tensed up a little to Regulus surprise. It wasn't a secret he fancied Evans, the whole bloody castle had known for years.

"Well it smelled sort of like freshly opened ink, vanilla..." His voice quieted. "And a little like broom polish."

Sirius smirked a little at Regulus, who's face was warming up. "Interesting mix there, Prongs. Doesn't exactly seem like Evans, does it?"

"No...not really." James tried to manage a light hearted laugh.

"Now, Reggie, I believe you owe an answer too."

Regulus wanted to slap that smirk from his brother's face. "Cardamom and cedar wood." He stared daggers at the floor. "And...broom polish...as well."

"Interesting. Very interesting." Sirius was so fucking smug that Regulus almost pulled out his wand to hex him, but he was distracted when James moved closer.

He looked up at him. "What, Potter? You got your answer."

James was smiling. His eyes were so kind. So lovely. "Yeah....I did."

Regulus felt his face burning. "Good." He threw one more glare at his brother and promptly left, but the entire time he swore he felt Potter's eyes never leave him until he was out of sight.

[addsalwayssick]

“Look what i’ve found, Haz!” Draco said as they were looking through the attic. He pulled out a box of pictures. They were old, from the 70s in fact. Draco shuffled through the pictures as Harry sat by him.

Harry pulled out a picture of his dad, James, and Sirius lying on the couch next to each other. Another one of Remus and Lily in the library. Marlene and Mary at 3 Broomsticks. James and Peter playing chess. Remus and Sirius kissing. They were all from when they were young, maybe 15 or 16.

“Your dad was fit,” Draco teased. Harry grinned at him and smacked his thigh.

Harry picked up a letter. He read through it carefully.

‘How I miss you. I want to see you. We haven’t talked. You don’t ever want to talk to me. You walk past in the halls and don’t ever say a word. Meet me in the room of requirements tonight. -James.’

We don’t talk enough, we should open up

Harry furrowed his eyebrows as he gathered piles of letters that said almost the same thing.

Before its all too much

He picked up a photograph of his dad and a man he didn’t recognize in their quidditch kits. The man had a Slytherin uniform on. He was number 12, and his dad was 21. His dad had his arms around him and was kissing him deeply.

Draco looked at the picture and gasped. “Is that Regulus?”

“Who?”

“Sirius’s younger brother.” Draco whispered.

They looked at the picture, then at each other. “They’re like us.” Harry mumbled.

Will we ever learn? We’ve been here before.

They read through the letters, detailing their romances. It detailed the way they loved. The secrecy. The way James was so deeply in love with Regulus it hurt.

There was only one letter from Regulus. It said, ‘James, i’m sorry, i’m so fucking sorry. Please forgive me. It wasn’t my choice. It was my parents. Please, I still love you. Please James, I love you.’

Harry’s hands shook as he dropped the letter, going downstairs to find Draco’s that said nearly the same thing. ‘Harry, I’m so sorry. I didn’t want to get it. Please, don’t hold this against me. My parents made me. I still love you. Please, Harry, I love you.’

It’s just what we know.

The last letter from James said. ‘I’m here Regulus. For whatever you need. If you need someone to love i’m here. If you need someone to hurt, im here. I’m sorry.’

Stop your crying baby, it’s the sign of the times.

_____<>

Based on sign of the times

[saintsenara]

You mentioned fanon turning barty crouch jr. into an uninteresting character. I don't know much about what the new fanon characterisation has really done with him, but I'm curious for your thoughts on why he's a canonically interesting character. I agree that he is, but it sounds like you might have some interesting thoughts on it that are already fleshed out.

thank you for the ask, @jamesunderwater, and i'm sorry for taking so long to drag myself around to answering this.

as you may have gathered if you’ve read my views on jegulus or wolfstar, the common fanon interpretation of marauders-era characters and i don’t really get on.

this is not a new development - me and goofy fanon sirius have been beefing for over a decade at this point, i fear - but our enmity has taken on a new form since [roughly] 2020, when the emergence of what we might call the modern marauders subfandom brought with it a whole series of expectations about characters, ships, personalities, and appearances in first war stories which - let me state my position immediately - have absolutely nothing to do with the characters as they are in canon.

i could talk about sirius or regulus or james or snape or lupin until the cows come home - as, i’m sure, could many of us - but i also dislike the expectations the marauders subfandom has around its supporting cast. these characters - who largely fall under the categories of women, slytherins, or both - have names that we might recognise from canon, but they are - to all intents and purposes - original characters.

to do some marauders fan defending, i do understand the rationale behind this. hogwarts is a school, and it needs to be filled with the sort of incidental characters that lightning-era writers can pull from the canon text [shoutout to ernie macmillan, the mvp]. if you’re writing about lily, then she needs friends - why not have them be alice, marlene, dorcas, emmeline, pandora etc.?

[well, because dumbledore isn’t running a child army. it makes no sense for the entire order of the phoenix to be in the same school year - and the idea that alice is probably around ten years older than lily, that pandora is around the same age as narcissa malfoy and isn’t a pureblood, and that marlene, dorcas, and emmeline are hard-nosed ministry bitches in their fifties who can have mad-eye moody quaking with just a look is something which can be prised from my cold, dead hands.]

and if you’re writing about the epic highs and lows of high-school football going to school during a sectarian conflict, then you need some antagonists. which is to say, you need some slytherins.

the issue i have is that the three key slytherins who seem to have been elevated to principal cast in the marauders pantheon - regulus black, barty crouch jr., and evan rosier - get what can only be called the smol bean treatment. that is, that three teenagers who all canonically join a terror organisation are turned into soft and tiny babies who thought lord voldemort was just feeling silly when he said, "my aim is the eradication of the muggleborn population through violent means."

and even fics which do acknowledge that the three willingly become terrorists often go out of their way to provide justifications for this which don’t contextualise their decision [something which is important - you can’t write about snape becoming a death eater without acknowledging the way that poverty, loneliness, and a sense of hopelessness make someone an easy target of radicalisation] but which minimise it. sometimes, their violence is turned into romantic vengeance - i’ve seen a fair amount of suggestions that barty goes to torture the longbottoms because frank was the auror who killed evan. sometimes, authors imply - or even outright state - that there’s no need to see these boys as aspiring villains: voldemort is right; the class system is good and should be maintained; and purebloods [usually james, sirius, regulus, barty, evan and maybe a token woman or two] should stick together while the half-breeds and the mudbloods go hang.

this - like all aristocracy wank in this fandom - annoys me enough with regulus and evan. but it’s particularly grating when it comes to barty crouch jr. because - unlike evan, who is literally just a name in the text, and regulus, who isn’t much more - he actually has a canon personality.

and it’s fascinating. indeed, i would even go so far as to say that barty crouch jr. is the greatest villain in the harry potter series.

[my apologies to lord voldemort.]

after all, even though he’s been imprisoned under the imperius curse for over a decade, barty is still so lucid and powerful that he is able to:

produce magic capable of tricking the goblet of fire, which is treated by all the adult characters involved as unprecedented.

pull off a year-long impersonation of a man whom dumbledore evidently knows extremely well without being clocked until his mission has been successful, even though his opportunities to observe the real moody can have been virtually non-existent. he is in character within seconds of his ambush on moody’s home - after the intruder-alert dustbins are set off - and is able to persuade ministry personnel who can be presumed to have met moody personally [including both amos diggory and arthur weasley, who appear to know him not only personally, but well] that he is the real deal. he maintains his performance even under close scrutiny from the teaching colleagues he has to interact with daily at hogwarts, despite the fact that he presumably can’t get a great deal out of the real moody, since he’s having to be kept deliberately weak and docile under the imperius curse.

manipulate multiple people into become accessories to his crimes, without ever being suspected of doing so. with the hindsight of knowing who he is, the first defence against the dark arts lesson in goblet of fire, in which "moody" deliberately distresses neville by using the cruciatus curse directly in front of him, before swooping in to be the person to cheer him up so that he can plant information which will help harry win the triwizard tournament and deliver him to voldemort, is chilling. he just gets unlucky that harry has the biggest martyr complex in human history.

commit murder on hogwarts’ grounds without ever being suspected of wrongdoing.

execute lord voldemort’s plan to kidnap harry and use him in his resurrection ritual flawlessly. the plan itself may be convoluted - but dark lords are allowed to have a flair for the dramatic, as a treat - but, crucially, it works, and barty succeeds in every respect.

but, i concede, we’re talking about the adult barty here. perhaps he was once a sweetheart who went unfortunately off the rails after his father sent him to prison and then - in effect - drugged him for years. that wouldn’t be a ridiculous suggestion.

except for the fact that - canonically - the teen barty was just as clever, sly, manipulative, and - above all - ardent in his support for voldemort as his adult self.

at his trial in the early 1980s, young barty gives the performance of a lifetime. he screams, he shakes, he looks terrified of the dementors, he is pale and weak and harmless-looking, he begs his mother to help him, he pleads with his father for mercy, he maintains his innocence as he's dragged off to his cell. he gives off the impression of simply having been in the wrong place at the wrong time so well that harry is almost certain that his conviction is illegitimate. so too, it is implied, is dumbledore.

indeed, barty plays the part of the wrongfully imprisoned so well that - as canon tells us - he not only influences public opinion to be broadly in favour of his probable innocence [or, at least, his diminished culpability - sirius suggests that the widespread view was that he was probably there, but that he only ended up involved in what was clearly bellatrix’s idea because of his father’s failure to relate to him properly], but also changes public opinion against the government’s anti-death-eater strategy entirely.

following his imprisonment, his father - a man who never met an extrajudicial punishment he didn’t like, and whose ruthless approach to dealing with the death eaters in the first war [such as his use of internment for suspected terrorists and his order to aurors to shoot to kill] was, we are told, enormously popular with the wizarding public - is forced to resign in disgrace from his role as head of the department of magical law enforcement. crouch sr. is quietly shuffled off into a boring bureaucratic position, his ambitions to be minister in tatters, and his only way forward to free his son from the prison cell where he is languishing for the crime he very literally did.

[as an aside, i do think that we are supposed to read bellatrix as the ringleader of the torture of the longbottoms. but, all too often, that gets reduced to her doing everything while rodolphus, rabastan, and barty just stand there gormlessly. they were clearly performing the curses too!]

now, barty’s unusual cunning can - of course - be explained by narrative reasons. the text needs to conceal that he’s the villain [since, as with philosopher’s stone, it wants to imply that the dark lord’s faithful servant at hogwarts is snape] until the very end - and this naturally requires dumbledore to not think too hard about whether his good judy alastor is behaving even more strangely than usual.

the text also needs to suggest that he's innocent in order to properly stick the landing on the narrative role of his father - barty crouch sr. as with dolores umbridge in order of the phoenix, crouch sr. exists to show harry [and the reader] that the rot in the wizarding world was not caused by - and will not stop with the defeat of - voldemort. his ruthlessness and inflexibility, his lack of respect for due process, his astonishingly cruel treatment of winky [brutal beyond even the standard way in which wizards abuse their enslaved elves] all serve to teach harry that the anti-voldemort cause can become just as easily corrupted as the disillusioned young men in voldemort’s orbit. the suggestion that crouch sent his own son to azkaban without good reason, simply because he would not deviate from his beliefs, is an important lesson to harry about what "justice" actually means.

but, despite this, barty is also able to pull off his deception because he’s spectacularly talented. it’s not all just narrative.

and his talents are caused by characteristics which aren’t good or bad in and of themselves. he’s clearly very intelligent [he got twelve owls, the series’ benchmark for genius]. he’s hyper-observant, creative, adaptable, good under pressure, and possessed of nerves of steel. he shares these traits with other villains in the series - voldemort above all - but he also shares them with plenty of the heroes. harry, for one.

which is to say that all of his personality traits could be put to non-criminal uses. but - as with harry, who is capable of being quite sinister when he wants to be [for example, when he manipulates slughorn into giving up the horcrux memory] - they would give a non-criminal barty an edge. and this doesn’t seem to be present in his standard fanon persona - as sweet and goofy as all marauders-era men - to any great extent.

finally, there is another aspect of barty’s character which is absent from his fanon version - that he clearly has some sort of childhood trauma, but that this does not excuse any of what he does.

even though crouch sr. is right to send him to azkaban, he was clearly also a cold and distant father, who had absolutely no idea how to relate to his son.

[as another aside, this emotional negligence is bad enough without it needing to be written as having been accompanied by extreme physical and/or sexual abuse. there seems to be a real tendency in fanfiction - not only in marauders-era stuff, although the exaggeration of orion and walburga black into despotic villains is one example of this - to make childhood misery "worse", in order to justify a character’s later actions.]

voldemort demonstrably uses barty’s terrible relationship with crouch sr. [and his absolutely flagrant daddy kink] to groom him into taking the dark mark [not least because there’s otherwise no explanation for why he cheerfully informs him that he too is named after his dad], which he may very well end up taking when he’s still at school. my reading is that he’s recruited to inform on his father - since voldemort would undoubtedly wish to keep the head of the department of magical law enforcement under constant surveillance - and that this is why the dark lord pays him the attention he is so obviously lacking.

but, as with snape and regulus and draco malfoy and all the other young death eaters, barty also colludes in his own radicalisation. voldemort is a master at ensnaring recruits, sure, but he’s also a busy man. he only bothers to make the effort because the clever, creative, cunning, manipulative young man - who wishes to avenge himself on the father who never paid him attention [sound familiar?] - he finds before him is very much determined to become a spectacular part of his terrorist organisation. and stories which feature him owe it to him to give him that dark complexity of character

show the series’ best villain some respect.

[stereotypicalswiftie]

Tattoos I think the marauders era characters would get

James: Sad star and happy star! he would get Sirius and Reg to hand draw them, Reg would try over and over to make it perfect but it would still turn out wonky. James doesn’t mind, he loves it all the same

Sirius: moon phase tattoo on his spine. He would get it as a surprise for remus, he wouldn’t even tell him about it afterwards. Remus only finds out once he has Sirius bent over…

Regulus: Sun tattoo on his lower back. Right where James likes to place his hand when they’re walking together. Of course the tattoo only makes James do it more often which was the intended result, even if regulus would never admit it

Barty and Evan: Rings. They both didn’t like the idea of a wedding band. It was too easy to lose, they wanted something permanent, and what’s more permanent than being etched into each other’s skin?

Lily: a lamb!! It was a joke that mary had started when lily was pregnant. Whenever she spoke to her bump, she always referred to the baby as her little lamb, a reference to the nursery rhyme both lily and mary loved as children. Even after harry was born,mary only referred to him as such. Lily’s tattoo was a tribute to her lover and her son

James (pt 2): water lily!! Sirius and James made a bet, loser had to get a drawing of harry’s tattooed. James lost (of course), and harry drew a picture of water lilies cuz they had the same name as his mum

Barty and Evan (pt 2): bite mark tats. Thats it.

Remus: Sirius’s kiss mark on his hip. Sirius had kissed him, he loved the mark so much he kept asking Sirius to redo it daily. Eventually when his birthday comes around, Sirius books him an appointment so they can find a more permanent solution. Its remus’s only tattoo but he couldn’t imagine getting one he loved more