Chapter Text
“What the hell are they doing,” Regulus breathes out, horrified as James swaps his acoustic guitar for an electric Stratocaster. Remus has dashed offstage and returned with an electric guitar for Sirius, too, and “That was the last song. That was supposed to be the last song.”
He doesn’t attend every show that they do—he can’t really manage to, especially now that he’s moved up at the planetarium—but James had begged him to go to “this one at least , love” and what was Regulus supposed to say? “No”?
Peter shouts out a countdown from four and James starts tearing his way through an upbeat riff. Remus has switched the mode of his keyboard. The lights whirl and flash in bursting bright colours and Barty, Evan and Pandora have all moved to stand behind Regulus in a sort of wall keeping him up at the front and blocking any sort of escape he might make.
“This one goes out to a special someone in the room!” James shouts, and Sirius fake gags into his microphone.
Don’t you dare, Regulus mouths fiercely, as if his boyfriend can see him.
Unfortunately, because Regulus has truly miserable taste in men, James doesn’t hesitate to start singing. “ I threw this Halloween party and I invited forty of my best friends! ”
Regulus feels a smile threaten to break out on his face at the words, an echo of a night in the planetarium months ago. One of the universes—one of the happier, simpler ones. A Halloween party, couples costumes, kids knocking at the door.
“That's when I first heard your name, and saying it tastes like violets, rum and summer,” James continues, “Padfoot had family stay from Canada. ”
Sirius leans towards his mic, rockstar-style, and calls, “ Prongsie, did you meet my brother ?”
“ And I said, ‘no, I didn’t!’ ” James shouts back at his bandmate. He turns to the audience, the flashing lights glinting off of his glasses as he scans the crowd. “ And you started coming over… ”
Regulus shouts, lost in the raucous roar of the audience, “I hate you!”
“ And my heart went ‘love him, he’s the one, and we shall wed’ and then my head said,” James belts, and the music drops out as the chorus comes in; a repetitive rhythm of questions, and Regulus’ face heats. James comes utterly alive under the stage lights, blinding white smile and stupid dancing, finger flying across the strings of his guitar.
(It’s a stupidly catchy song.)
His boyfriend looks downright euphoric and Regulus forgets why it was such a big deal at all that James is literally singing to a crowd of nearly a thousand about pining over his bandmate’s brother.
As soon as the lighting crew drops one of the spotlight beams into the pit and directly onto Regulus, he remembers very quickly. “You’re fucking kidding me.”
“ He has these eyes, grey-blue,” James sings and fucking points at him, as if the literal beam of light isn’t enough to make him stand out.
Sirius cackles. “He's like five two and two years younger than me.”
James practically skips up towards the edge of the stage, singing all the while. “ He's fun and weird and smart, likes shooting stars and can shotgun a beer like no other .”
“I’m going to eviscerate you,” Regulus whisper-shouts, but James makes his resolve crumble to dust with a single look.
“ That’s when I became his only guy and now I date Pads’ brother,” his boyfriend declares, obnoxiously triumphant as he slings an arm over Sirius’ shoulder. The crowd is beginning to frenzy, jostling the wall of Regulus’ friends to try to get a look at him. Regulus has eyes for no one other than his idiot boyfriend, who finishes the song off with a grand riff and a final, victorious, “ Pads’ brother !”
(Regulus has over three hundred follow requests on Instagram and seven fan accounts by the time they get home. As a direct result of Regulus’ fist, James’ upper arm is sporting a bruise almost big enough to rival his smile.)