Contents

Simply the Best

Epilogue

“Would you mind redoing my back?” asks Regulus. “I think I might be burning a bit.”

Barty puts down the book and obliges, smoothing the lotion into Regulus’s skin with slow, careful hands. Regulus closes his eyes, lets himself enjoy the feeling—the quiet intimacy of the touch. When Barty finishes, Regulus shifts onto his side and looks at his boyfriend. Barty has a pair of vintage Ray-Bans perched on his nose, shirt abandoned on the sand—all brown skin and black ink—because Barty, unlike him, actually does tan. He’s lying on his back, head propped on a folded towel. Tattoos crawl across his arms and down his ribs. His legs too. Tattoos Regulus has loved since the first moment he saw them. Raw, imperfect. Messy. Real. Barty’s life etched across his skin like poetry Regulus wants to spend the rest of eternity reciting.

The water stretches out behind Barty, so blue it barely looks real—like something conjured from a half-remembered dream. Regulus feels himself smile. Even now—nearly twenty-six years old, seven years since they first collided—he still doesn’t quite know how to hold the staggering truth of it: that this man, wild and beautifully erratic, charismatic and brilliant and clever, had chosen him. Keeps choosing him.

Barty picks up the book again, thumb tapping idly against the margin. He doesn’t ask if Regulus wants him to keep reading aloud—he just does, picking up where he’d left off, voice low and unhurried, letting the words unspool into the warm, salt-sweet air. Regulus closes his eyes again. He’s always loved Barty reading to him. Loved his accent—the cadence and rhythm of his voice, his ability to make any story, any prose or poetry or philosophy, any words at all, more than what they are. To turn them into a tide that pulls you under.

“He lashed the waves into towering walls of water,
And the strong sailor’s heart faltered with fear,
Yet even so he held on, battered and broken,
Driven by longing deeper than any storm,
Longing to stand once more on the earth of his home,
To feel the living soil beneath his feet,
Even if it meant death itself pressing close.”

Regulus listens, half-drowsing—thinks absently that if the gods ever knew loneliness, it must have felt like this. Not the absence of people—but the terror of finding something precious and not being able to face losing it. Something so treasured you live every day in fear the world will take it away.

The days pass in heat-hazed afternoons: the lazy sprawl of limbs on sun-bleached sand, the tang of salt drying on skin, the murmur of Barty’s voice weaving old stories into the blue sweep of the sky. They fall asleep beneath olive trees, tangled together like a myth retold too many times to remember its beginning. Long walks through narrow streets still warm from the sun, the stones underfoot whispering secrets. The world smells of thyme and smoke, sea-salt and citrus. Regulus wants to press each moment into something permanent—fix them in amber so he might take them with him when they leave.

On their last night, they sit side by side on a crumbling wall that edges a cliff, watching the sky bruise itself into darkness. The sea below glitters with the last light of the day. Barty laces their fingers together without speaking. His thumb draws absent, soothing circles over the back of Regulus’s hand. Regulus looks down at their hands, fingers intertwined—and wonders if Barty would marry him if he asked. He thinks he’d like that. His parents would be an issue, but he pushes that part of the thought away, focusing instead on the other bit: the bit where he imagines binding Barty to him forever, holding on tightly and never letting go.

Yes—he’d definitely like that.

They’ve been together long enough, he thinks. Nineteen to almost twenty-six. Twenty-two to twenty-nine. Regulus doesn’t count the breakups, doesn’t count the months lost in between—doesn’t count the people in between either, because they don’t count. No one ever has, no one but Barty. It’s always been him, and Regulus knows with unfiltered certainty that it always will be.

He takes Barty back to London with him. He would have gone to Edinburgh, but Barty says he fancies a week down south. Something about giving Evan the place to himself a little longer. Regulus raises an eyebrow at that, faintly amused—points out that Evan has already had it to himself for two and a half months. Barty shrugs, says lightly that Evan is seeing someone.

At that, Regulus looks at him, curious. “Really? Someone actually made it past a first date?”

Barty flashes a smile, all teeth and wicked amusement. “Dinnae ken if they’ve actually been on a date, but aye—think he’s found someone who likes him enough to sit through whatever hellish excuse for entertainment he can dream up.”

And Regulus smiles back—small, genuine—and thinks: good. He knows the way Evan dates is a defence. Knows he’s doing it to push people away. What he’s never understood—what he probably never will—is why. It’s never made sense. Evan isn’t like him. He isn’t afraid of his own heart. He isn’t so twisted up inside that wanting something becomes a kind of cruelty. He’s brave, and solid, and searingly honest—both with himself and with the world. It’s the thing Regulus admires most about him. Someone must have broken Evan, Regulus thinks. Someone Regulus doesn’t know about—hurt him enough that he doesn’t speak of it. After school. After Clare. But not her—Evan had been upset when she cheated, yes, but he’d carried it as if he knew better than to bleed for something that couldn’t love him properly. No, this was later. In Edinburgh. After Evan had come to see him at Oxford. After he’d brought Barty into Regulus’s life and cracked it open.

Regulus hadn’t noticed at first because he’d been too distracted by Barty—too wrapped up in the fragile, furious miracle of him, of them. Hadn’t had enough of himself left over to notice just how deep the cracks running through his best friend were. Not until later. He’d asked, when he had noticed. A year later, maybe. Evan had just shrugged, told him yeah—something had happened, but he didn’t want to talk about it. And that had been the end of it.

Regulus probably should have pushed. Made Evan tell him—made him face whatever he was running from. It’s what Evan would have done for him. But who was Regulus to call anyone else a coward? Not him. Not him, who had almost thrown everything good away more than once because fear was easier than faith. Not him, who had nearly broken the only person he had ever loved with the jagged edges of his own damage.

No. He had no right to ask Evan anything. And so he hadn’t. But now, sitting in the back of a black cab winding through London, Barty dozing lightly against his shoulder, Regulus finds himself hoping. Hoping that Evan has found someone. Someone good. Someone brave. Someone who can see the rare, sharp brilliance of him—see through the dark humour and the fuck it attitude. Someone like Evan himself.

Barty goes back to Edinburgh after a week, and Regulus misses him the minute he’s gone. He stands in the doorway after the cab pulls away, feeling the hollow of it settle in his chest like a stone. He thinks again of the thought he’d had in Greece—on that cliff edge, with the sea bleeding into the sky—and turns it over, slow and careful. Thinks about what it would be like if he never had to miss Barty again. If he could have him all the time. Every day—for the rest of his life. Forever. The idea is just as dangerous, just as unbearably appealing, as it had been then. It’s got its claws in him, sunken deep—he thinks he’ll probably succumb to it. Probably already has. Just isn’t quite brave enough yet. But he’s trying to learn how to be brave. Wants to. Thinks he can—thinks—no, he knows, with every fibre of his being, that Barty is worth being brave for.

One day slips into another, and then into a week. Regulus writes. He thinks. He takes long walks through the late summer rain-glossed streets of London. He goes to dinner at Sirius, Remus, and James’s flat. Remus cooks; Sirius is already halfway through a bottle of red, lounging sideways across the sofa, bare feet tucked under a worn cushion.

James isn’t there. Regulus asks, because he always notices when James is missing. Sirius glances up at him, something pensive passing across his face.

“Not sure,” he says. “He wasn’t here when we got back. Wherever he took off to after Barcelona—assume he’s still there. I think he left to see someone. Went to try and woo his mystery man.”

That’s when the idea first stirs. He considers it. Says nothing to Sirius or Remus. Lets it drift past, like smoke. It’s probably nothing. Coincidence. Wishful thinking. Later, though—alone in his flat—he thinks about it again. It seems unlikely. As far as he knows, James and Evan have never spent more than a few nights out together—the longest stretch being that weekend in Edinburgh, at the end of last summer.

He pauses there, frowning.

That trip James had come on—at the last minute. The trip Barty had mistrusted from the start. The one Regulus had defended without thinking, because James had walked away from him months before. Because he had believed—needed to believe, lest guilt eat him alive—that James had no reason left to want anything from him. Regulus thinks back to the afternoon James had turned up at his flat. Over a year and a half ago now. He doesn’t like to think about that afternoon—the one where he’d nearly undone everything. Himself, Barty, any hope of friendship with James, all of it—because he’d been sad and lonely and broken, and because old habits die louder than they die well.

The day James had called him a fucking idiot.

That had surprised Regulus. Hurt him—not because it wasn’t true, it was. But because he hadn’t expected it from James. It was the kind of thing Evan would do. Turn up at his house unexpectedly and make him face himself. And now, revisiting it in the half-light of distance, Regulus lets the thought unfold carefully. What if it wasn’t a coincidence? What if the reason it had sounded like Evan was because it was—at least in part. Evan’s words, his influence coming out of James’s mouth?

Regulus considers the European tour. How James, who could have had anyone, hadn’t even looked. Had thrown away chances like he didn’t see them. How he’d stopped looking at Regulus too—not out of anger, but as if whatever need had once lived there had turned its face to someone else. And then Barcelona, where James had suddenly folded—the life going out of him like something terrible had happened. He’d left right afterwards, hadn’t even said goodbye. Left a note. What if the way James had crumbled had been about Evan—about the fact that he hadn’t come? And what if the reason Evan hadn’t come had been James? He thinks about Barty. How his suspicion of James had vanished seemingly overnight.

It had seemed a miracle at the time, something inexplicable. But maybe it wasn’t. Maybe Barty knew more than he was letting on. Maybe he knew exactly where James had gone after Barcelona. Regulus considers asking him—but thinks Barty probably wouldn’t tell him, not if Evan didn’t want him to. Barty was unwaveringly loyal to Evan. Regulus might have been jealous if he hadn’t loved Evan as much as Barty did. And so he doesn’t ask. He just quietly sits on the idea—waiting to see if it changes, solidifies, takes the shape of something real.

When James gets back a week later, he’s happy. It’s obvious in everything he does—in the way he moves, lighter somehow, in the way he smiles without seeming to realise it. The kind of happiness that is unguarded, that leaks out through the cracks of a person’s soul. The kind that is impossible to hide. Sirius notices. Of course he does. He circles James like a dog catching the scent of something he wants—teases, needles, tries to drag the truth out of him. But James only grins—wide and reckless and radiant—and says nothing. And Regulus thinks that maybe there’s confirmation in that alone.

Several weeks later his suspicions are indisputably confirmed. Not just confirmed—declared, with blaring headlines. It happens when the band, bar James, are together—by some small whim of the gods, like the final act of a play in which all is revealed before the curtain falls. To set the scene: Regulus’s boiler breaks, forcing him to abandon pride and make his way to his brother’s flat to beg the use of Sirius’s shower. Peter is occupying the sofa in a way that suggests long-standing familiarity and a certain lack of better options. Sirius looks amused when Regulus arrives; Peter looks surly—but then, that is the natural cast of his features, so for all Regulus knows he could be having the time of his life.

Sirius turns, grinning wickedly. “Reggie—you’ll never guess what happened.”

“Fuck’s sake,” Peter mutters, already defensive. “Stop telling everyone.”

Regulus lifts an eyebrow, delicately.

“Pete got asked out by a bloke and he said yes.”

“I said maybe,” Peter growls. “Maybe, Sirius. Not yes.”

Regulus forgets about the broken boiler and the need for a shower. He sits—folding himself neatly into the armchair, intrigued.

“Did you really?”

Peter had always struck him, in the least offensive way possible, as the absolute embodiment of straight male mediocrity. He was the last person Regulus expected to expand his rather narrow understanding of the spectrum of sexuality, let alone experiment with it himself.

Peter shrugs, looks a bit embarrassed. “Thought it might be worth a go. Nothing else is working.”

“Hear that, Rem?” Sirius calls gleefully towards the kitchen.

Remus leans into view, spoon in hand, expression bemused. “What?”

“Pete thinks being gay might be worth a go.”

“Not gay,” Peter huffs immediately, as though the very word is a personal attack. “Just... like bi or whatever.” He swigs his beer miserably, like a soldier preparing for a battle he neither understands nor wants to fight.

Remus, wisely, says nothing. Just disappears back into the kitchen, shaking his head.

“Who asked you out?” asks Regulus, curious.

“Albus’s assistant,” mumbles Peter.

“Alan?” Regulus frowns.

Peter shakes his head. “New assistant. Gill.”

“Blond. Smarmy,” supplies Sirius, looking like he’s having the time of his life. “You’ve definitely met him—he’s the one who wanted us to do the BuzzFeed thing with the puppies.”

Regulus suppresses a smile. He remembers Gill. Attractive, in the sort of way that suggests long-standing and ill-justified arrogance.

“He’s... enthusiastic,” Regulus allows diplomatically.

“He’s pushy as fuck,” Sirius corrects. Then, turning back to Peter, he adds with vicious affection: “If you’re going to start shagging men, Pete, I think you could do better.”

Peter sighs heavily. “Yeah, well. That’s the bit I’m not sold on. Reckon the other stuff’s fine—just hanging out, having a laugh. It’s the shagging I’m not sure about. Seems a bit much.”

“While it’s not strictly a requirement,” Regulus says dryly, “I’d say for most of us it’s a fairly big part of the boyfriend experience.”

Peter grimaces. “Yeah, I figured as much,” he says gloomily—almost endearing in the defeated expression on his face.

Regulus, despite himself, smiles. “Why didn’t you just say no?”

Peter takes another sip of his beer. “You lot are all happy. James has his secret boyfriend he thinks we don’t know about. I’m miserable and alone. The bloke smells great. Nice hair. Figured—fuck it. May as well at least consider it. Seems like it’s working out pretty well for all of you.”

Regulus and Sirius exchange a look. And then both of them start to laugh.

Peter scowls darkly. “Oh, fuck off—I thought gays were meant to be supportive.” He slams his beer down with theatrical indignation. “Remus!” he yells towards the kitchen. “Where’s James? I’ve had enough of these two unsympathetic fruitcakes.”

Sirius only laughs harder, practically doubled over. Peter flips him off—the gesture almost lazy in its inevitability. Remus appears from the kitchen, serene as ever, carrying a tray laden with lasagne, plates, glasses, and another bottle of wine. He deposits it neatly on the coffee table. Regulus decides the shower can wait.

“Paris, we think,” supplies Remus, settling onto the couch beside Sirius.

“Fucking great,” grumbles Peter. “He’s the one I wanted to talk to—not Glam-Rock-Me-Not and bloody Goth Twinklet here.” He throws Regulus and Sirius both dirty looks.

“Oh, don’t be like that, Pete,” says Sirius. “I’ll even make you a Grindr profile so you don’t have to date Albus’s twatty assistant.”

Peter shakes his head and points his beer at Sirius. “No way—you’re not getting me with that. I know what Grindr is, you wanker. Remus already told me it’s not just gay Tinder.”

“It’s true,” says Remus, sipping his wine. “We had a whole conversation about it.”

Sirius pokes Remus playfully. “Dammit, why must you always ruin my fun?”

“Perhaps,” Regulus says, “we should get you on Raya.”

Peter grunts. “Got it. And Hinge. And Bumble. And POF—got fucking all of them. You’d think being in a famous band would get me laid. Has it fuck. Bloody curse of the drummer.”

Sirius makes a comment about Travis Barker doing all right for himself. Peter says something about being desperate but not desperate enough for a Kardashian. Regulus asks what James is doing in Paris. Sirius reaches under the coffee table to the shelf beneath it and retrieves a card, handing it across to Regulus with a flourish. Regulus looks down at a garish, over-saturated photograph of the Eiffel Tower lit up at night. He frowns faintly and flips the card open. Inside, there is only a single question mark. Nothing else. He frowns. Looks up to find Sirius watching him, grinning like the Cheshire Cat.

“Left a few days ago,” Sirius says. “Didn’t say where he was going. Just said he was ‘off for a bit’ and ran out the door before we had time to interrogate him.”

Regulus arches an eyebrow at his brother. “Don’t you have better things to do than interrogate James about his comings and goings?”

“Not really,” says Sirius, unbothered. “Listen—we found that in his room afterwards. Current working theory: romantic getaway to Paris. The secret boyfriend strikes again.”

Remus smiles affectionately at his boyfriend. “By we, he means him,” he says. “Sirius was in there snooping about five minutes after James left. It was truly shameless.”

“My prime suspect,” says Sirius, ignoring Remus as he spoons lasagne onto his plate, “is one of the Prewetts.”

“The Emperium guys?” asks Peter, looking genuinely interested.

Regulus nods. The Prewett brothers ran a London-based indie record label. He’d only ever met the younger of the two—Gideon—but he had seemed pleasant enough, and Regulus was fairly certain he was married.

He says as much to Sirius, who only shrugs, apparently untroubled by such trivialities.

“It would make sense, wouldn’t it?” Sirius says breezily. “Maybe that’s why James is being all hush-hush. Maybe he’s having an affair with a married man. Or he’s sleeping with Fabian and doesn’t want the press to find out because of the age difference.”

“Or maybe,” Remus says, fondly exasperated, “he just doesn’t want you nosing about in his business. And knows you will.”

Or maybe it’s Evan, thinks Regulus. He doesn’t say it. Of course he doesn’t.

Sirius’s phone begins to ring. Not his usual ringtone—“Rebel Rebel”—but “Highway to Hell”. He makes an unpleasant face at the phone and then answers it.

“Hey, man. What’s up?” A pause. A frown. “Ah, right. Er—he’s away. No, haven’t spoken to him.”

Another pause. Sirius’s eyebrows lift, sceptical.

“Yeah—yeah, I’ll tell them.”

More silence. Then: “Yeah, cool. Will do. Right, bye.”

He hangs up. “Al’s trying to get hold of James,” he says to the room at large, beginning to text—presumably James. “Apparently he’s been trying him for hours. Wants me to tell you all to tell James to call him immediately if you hear from him.”

Peter snorts. “You’ve got Albus’s ringtone as ‘Highway to Hell’?”

Sirius shrugs, still texting. “Seemed fitting.” He puts his phone away.

“Wonder why,” says Remus, frowning slightly. “Hope everything’s all right.”

Peter grins. “Probably got caught doing something naughty in Paris.”

Or someone, thinks Regulus—

“Al didn’t sound happy,” says Sirius. “I’ll tell you that.”

Regulus pulls out his phone and types James’s name into Safari. The results load almost instantly—a siege of headlines. His suspicions, as it turns out, were correct. He smiles. The Sun. The Daily Mirror. The Metro. The Evening Standard. All blaring. But that’s not where it ends—every newspaper in the country has picked up the story. The Independent—JAMES POTTER’S PARISIAN REVEAL: WHY THE ROCKSTAR’S NEW RELATIONSHIP HAS EVERYONE TALKING. The Guardian—WHEN ROCK ROYALTY MEETS ACTUAL ROYALTY: JAMES POTTER’S PARISIAN DEBUT WITH LORD EVAN ROSIER SPARKS QUESTIONS ABOUT CELEBRITY, CLASS, AND PRIVACY.

Regulus clicks on The Guardian headline.

The photograph fills the screen. James, guitar case slung in one hand. And beside him—navy jumper, dark trousers, sunglasses shielding his eyes—Evan. Unmistakable.

“Oh dear,” Regulus says, with amusement. “They’re going to kill him.”

Sirius raises an eyebrow. “Who?”

Regulus looks up. “His parents.”

Sirius frowns, concern knitting his brows. “What could he possibly have done that would upset Eff and Monty—?”

Regulus shakes his head. “Not James’s parents. Evan’s.”

Peter, who has evidently grown tired of waiting for answers, pulls out his own phone. He scrolls for a moment. “It’s everywhere,” he says. “No More Girls on Tour? James Potter Sparks Controversy Amongst British Elite.” He squints at something farther down the page. “Oh look, there’s a video.” The sound of a crowd emanates from his phone. He frowns. “Hang on a minute—” He looks up. “—wait, is he actually a lord?”

Sirius snatches Peter’s phone out of his hands, staring at it, eyes wide.

“Least put it on the telly so I can see,” grumbles Peter.

Sirius does. A second later it’s on the large TV mounted on the wall. The video restarts. Shaky at first, handheld—but Regulus barely notices. The crowd outside the luxury Paris apartment is vast. Fans, paparazzi, reporters, all crushed together in a chaos of flashing lights and shouted questions. Beyond them, the sky is soft and pale, as if even Paris has been stunned into a kind of hush.

The doors to the building swing open. And James walks out—black t-shirt, dark jeans, sunglasses on his nose. And beside him—Evan. White linen shirt, tailored navy trousers. No attempt at disguise. No hat, no hoodie, no downcast eyes. They move together through the crush of cameras and screaming fans like it’s nothing. Like they’re untouchable. James slings a tattooed arm around Evan’s shoulders, pulling him close. Evan leans into it without hesitation, slipping his own arm around James’s waist—the movement easy, unmistakable. Possessive, as if he’s daring anyone to try and stop him. James says something to him, leaning in, mouth against Evan’s ear—whatever it is, it makes Evan smirk, sharp. He nods. They slide into a waiting taxi together, but not before Evan turns and flips off the paparazzi with both hands and a shit-eating grin.

The video cuts out.

Silence—stunned from Sirius and Remus. Peter just looks amused.

“Guess we know who the secret boyfriend is,” he says. “Way to hard launch. No wonder Albus is having kittens.”

“What—how—when?” manages Sirius. He turns on Regulus, pointing a finger at him accusingly. “Did Ev tell you about this? About James?”

Regulus shakes his head. “No.” And then: “But I thought they might be seeing each other,” he admits.

Sirius looks outraged. “And you didn’t tell me? My two best friends are—” he waves a hand at the TV as if lost for words. “And you didn’t tell me?!?”

Regulus smiles at his brother. “I couldn’t have told you for certain until just now. I may have suspected, but I didn’t know.”

“But—” says Sirius. “But how—they hardly even know each other.”

Peter snorts. “Since when do you need to know someone to fuck them?”

“That—” Sirius shakes his head, then points at the TV. “—is not just fucking. Ev’s folks are traditional in the worst way possible, conservative as fuck, and totally going to flip out at this. Reggie is right—they’re going to kill him. Actually kill him. Going public? Flipping off the paps like that? He’s done for. Absolutely done for.”

“I think,” says Regulus slowly, “that might be exactly the point he’s making.”

Sirius’s eyebrows shoot up. “You think he’s dating James to piss off Elaine and Marc?”

“No,” says Regulus. “I think he’s telling them he’s done with them.”

“Oh,” says Sirius. Then his eyes go wide. “Oh, shit. You think he’s doing it because of James—they’re that serious?”

Regulus frowns. “I’m not sure,” he says honestly. “Perhaps it’s because of James. Perhaps it’s just because he wants to. But either way, I think it’s safe to say that this thing between him and James isn’t just a fling. I think it’s been going on for quite a long time.”

“What makes you think that?” asks Sirius.

Regulus shrugs. “James calls me Reg.”

Sirius blinks. “So?”

“You, Barty, and Remus call me Reggie. Peter—when he’s not calling me something mildly homophobic—calls me Baby Black. James used to call me Regulus, and then a bit over a year ago he started calling me Reg. I didn’t realise at first, but then it occurred to me a couple of weeks ago that the only other person who has ever called me Reg is Evan.”

A brief silence.

Sirius frowns, processing it. “Oh,” he says finally. And then his face breaks into a wide, delighted grin. He laughs, rubs his hands together gleefully like a cartoon villain. “Oh, this is brilliant. I’m absolutely making them get married. Registry office, Vegas, shotgun wedding—I don’t care. It’s happening.”

Regulus laughs. And then he thinks about Barty. About the cliff in Greece, and the idea that had followed him home. Thinks that maybe later tonight—after Peter leaves—he might tell Sirius about it. Thinks that Sirius, somehow, might be able to help him figure out how to be brave enough to turn it from an idea into a reality.