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“I would’ve liked running away with you, I think. I really would’ve.”
“Yeah,” Lily says, clutching at his hand and feeling her voice break, a lump in her throat, “me too.”
Regulus takes a deep breath, from where he’s sitting on the cold stone floor beside her, and she can feel his hesitation – can read it perfectly in the way he sits, the way he holds her hand tightly.
The way he glances at her, brief, as if the sight would be too much to bear.
“How- how do you think it would’ve been? If we’d managed to?” He asks finally.
She inhales sharply against the onslaught of feelings – of memories.
“I don’t know why I thought this place would be... lighter, I guess.” Lily says and sips at her tea, looking around the magically lit kitchen, at the house elves running from side to side with dishes floating behind them.
“Ours is even darker,” Regulus sighs, pushing his treacle tart to the side, “I guess when you’re not the one cooking, you don’t really care about natural light. There’s magic for that, anyway.”
Lily frowns, thoughtful. It’s not the same, she wants to say, you know it isn’t.
But maybe because he knows, it’s better to not bring it up. It’s still new, this thing between them – this fragile friendship they’ve built over hurt and mutual understanding and far too many meetings in the library for it to be accidental.
She likes what they have, so far.
She likes Regulus and his quick wit and quiet, introspective personality. The mean bite to his words whenever someone’s being particularly daft and the hidden gentleness of his hands when he hands her brand new quills and ink pots.
“I wouldn’t want to use magic for that, if I built a home myself,” He says, smiling drily even as his voice takes on a secretive tone, as if he were confessing a scandalous secret, “Merlin, I’d paint the entire thing yellow just to make it brighter.”
She laughs before she can help it, terribly amused at the way he’d spit out the word, like he couldn’t quite believe himself.
“Well, that’s unexpected. But nice,” Lily smiles, imagining sunshine and yellow cabinets and Regulus, stubbornly scowling at a colour he picked by himself, “That sounds really nice, actually. Might have to steal that.”
“By all means, Evans,” He raises a forkful of the tart in her direction as if he were toasting to her, “Not like I’m ever going to actually do anything like that.”
The reminder of his situation sours her mood – her tea tastes bitter, all of a sudden.
“Yellow kitchen?”
“You know I’d hate that.” But there’s a smile pulling at his lips.
“I know for a fact the Slytherin beds are bigger,” Regulus says and Lily spots the way he pushes down an amused smile, “Because Slughorn uses a charm on them every year.”
“You- he what?” Lily exclaims shrilly, dropping her quill on the table and swatting at his arm when he starts laughing at the giant ink stain on her parchment, “I swear, Mary has fallen out of bed twelve separate times just this year- and I keep waking up with my arm hanging off of it! How is this fair?”
“It’s not,” Regulus states, smiling and closing his charms textbook, giving up on all pretences of studying, “I never said it was.”
Lily scowls, following his example before she can cause anymore damage.
“Someday, all this will be a distant nightmare- because I’ll have found the most comfortable bed in the world and I’ll never have to worry about splitting my head open on the awful stone floor in the middle of the night.”
“Sure,” He laughs, stepping away from their little corner of the library, “until then I’ll enjoy my perfectly good bed and check your head for bumps whenever we meet.”
“There’s no bump!” Lily says at his retreating back, stubbornly.
He waves a hand at her, sarcastic, but doesn’t turn.
They both know that there is, in fact, a very noticeable bump right in the middle of her forehead.
“Well, obviously I would’ve found my perfect bed.”
“Huge and full of unnecessary pillows, no doubt.”
Lily knocks her shoulder against his, gasping in offense just to hear him laugh.
“No pillow is ever unnecessary.”
It’s quiet, when she wakes – sunlight streams through the windows, into an unused classroom on the third floor.
Lily takes a moment to breathe it in, observing the curved line of the glass and the perfect blue sky behind it, before letting herself indulge in the boy sleeping beside her.
Regulus lays tangled up in the conjured blankets, facing her, perfectly at ease. She never sees him like this, when he's awake. There’s always something – a furrow in his brow, tension in his shoulders, fingers trembling around a quill.
And Lily is seventeen years old, in the midst of a war, and her heart skips a beat for the wrong boy, the one she’ll inevitably lose.
So who can blame her, if she stares a moment too long? If she basks in the quiet calm surrounding them, just this once?
If she lets herself believe, just for a moment?
She brushes off a curl that had fallen over his lids, slowly, and imagines waking up like this, every morning – imagines sunshine over soft green sheets, over bright yellow counters.
Imagines how he might look, bathed in warm light, beautiful and hers to keep.
“And lots of light,” she adds, “that’s a must.”
“That’s the only thing we agree on.” Regulus says and they both know it’s a lie.
“It would’ve been good,” Lily states, firm, “You know it would’ve been.”
He looks at her, eyes growing dimmer by the second, and she wonders if he’ll hold this over her – this refusal to let him hide behind a lie, this Gryffindor need to face the truth head on.
Maybe they both will, someday. Maybe she’ll wake up cursing her own name, but the alternative would’ve been worse.
To let him convince them both that it would’ve been nothing, Lily knows she would’ve regretted that more than anything.
“Yes,” Regulus says at last, gentle and oh-so-quiet “It would’ve been perfect.”
She swallows. Nods.
And then there are no more words and no more time – there is a war and no more Regulus and, oh, there's the pain. I knew it was coming and it hurts anyway.
Silly little Lily, her mum used to say forever ago, always getting herself in trouble.
Silly little Lily, she thinks now, willingly giving herself up to the slaughter only to be surprised by the knife.
In the morning, when Lily Evans will leave Hogwarts for the last time, she won’t look back to find him.
He won’t be there, anyway.