This is the first thing I've written for a while, so I apologise if it isn't my best. I was mostly focused on actually getting something written over whether it was actually good.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy!

Stupid

It had been a long day and Regulus was glad to get back to the Slytherin common room so that he could take his mind off schoolwork for a little while and just relax and hang out with his best friend, Barty. Now that they were in sixth year, they didn't have as many lessons together anymore, so it was hard to find time to hang out when their timetables clashed most days of the week. But between their lessons and free periods and Regulus's prefect duties, they had somehow found time to realise that they were madly in love with each other and Regulus had managed to splutter a nervous, "shall we be together?" one afternoon before they both hurried off to their respective lessons. Barty's response had been an excited high-pitched squeal of, "YES!" as he got shoved and pushed into a flow of students heading to their classrooms, his head poking up over the top of the crowd and grinning at Regulus. Since then, things had been a whirlwind, but Regulus just liked to get back to the common room at the end of the school day to just be with Barty.

He stepped into the common room with his bag slung over his shoulder and scanned the room for Barty. Weird, he thought. He couldn't see him anywhere. Regulus supposed he might be in the dorm, so he started walking towards the door that led down a staircase to the sixth year boys' dorm. As he walked, his eyes seemed to flicker to the corner of the room where he spotted Barty chatting away animatedly to one of their dorm-mates, Corban Yaxley. Regulus watched them, seemingly stuck in place where he'd stopped. Yaxley was laughing loudly, reaching out to grab Barty's shoulder for support. Barty was grinning and his eyes were full of excitement. He was making strange hand gestures, which only seemed to make Yaxley laugh more.

Regulus frowned. He wondered what was so hilarious. He'd never seen Yaxley laugh so much in his life and they'd lived in the same dorm for six years. His long blond hair was tied back into a neat ponytail at the base of his neck, and Regulus had the sudden urge to yank it really hard. Yaxley's hair was stupid, Regulus decided in that moment. It was stupidly blond and stupidly straight and stupidly long. It was stupidly stupid. He scowled at the offensive hair and then decided to focus on Yaxley's face. His eyes were far too green for Regulus's liking. It couldn't be his natural eye colour. He must have put some sort of enhancement charm on them, making his eyes appear greener and more vibrant than they actually were. And that mouth. You could fit five dragon eggs in there! Regulus was repulsed. What kind of idiot would put dragon eggs in their mouth? A stupid one, Regulus thought resolutely.

"Reg!"

Barty's exclamation broke Regulus out of his thoughts. He blinked and turned his attention away from Yaxley and towards Barty, who was smiling at him and waving for him to come over. Regulus cleared his throat and pulled his bag back onto his shoulder, for it had been slowly slipping down his arm through his scowling. He straightened up and walked towards his boyfriend.

"Hello," he said, paying no attention to Yaxley, as though he didn't exist.

"Are you alright?" Barty asked. "You looked like you were in pain."

Regulus snorted. "I wasn't in pain."

"You looked constipated," Yaxley chimed in, grinning from ear to ear. Regulus turned to him and scowled once more.

"Well I'm not," he snapped, folding his arms and allowing himself a closer look at the annoying face of his stupid dorm-mate. Yaxley seemed to be taken aback at Regulus's sudden outburst.

"What's wrong?" Barty asked tentatively, placing a hand on Regulus's arm gently.

"I'm fine," Regulus said through gritted teeth. "Can I talk to you? Alone?"

Regulus watched Barty and Yaxley exchange confused looks, and Regulus got the intense urge to scratch his head. And so he did, proceeding to "accidentally" elbow Yaxley in the face as he brought his arm up. "Oh my god, Yaxley! I'm so sorry!" he said theatrically.

Yaxley didn't look amused; on the contrary, he looked as though he wanted nothing more than to punch Regulus in the face, but he seemed to decide against it. He muttered, "jerk," and put a hand up to his face, wincing and storming away from them irritably.

"Jerk to you too!" Regulus said under his breath, not loud enough for Yaxley to hear him. Smiling somewhat proudly, he turned his attention back to Barty, who was staring at him in bewildered silence. Regulus's smile faltered. "Why are you looking at me like that?"

Barty shook his head and shrugged. "You were… kinda… mean."

"Mean?" Regulus said. That was laughable! The only person who was mean was Yaxley and his girly ridiculous hair.

"You don't think you were mean?" Barty asked. "You elbowed him in the face."

"It was an honest accident," Regulus replied, feigning innocence. "I had to scratch my head. It was itchy!" When Barty just stared at him in an obvious struggle to find something to say back, Regulus continued. "So why were you talking to him anyway?"

"Because he's my… friend?" Barty said slowly, visibly very confused as to why this was an issue. Regulus frowned.

"Since when?"

"Since always," Barty said. "We've lived with him for six years. Do you not like him or something?"

Regulus breathed out through his nose, annoyed. "I wasn't aware you had friends."

"So… do you not like him or something?" Barty repeated, ignoring Regulus's previous statement about his lack of friends.

Regulus shrugged. "He's got annoying hair, and the fact that his face is so ugly makes him look like a horse. An ugly, stupid horse, with a long stupid mane that he ties in a stupid ponytail." Regulus huffed and folded his arms again.

Much to Regulus's surprise, Barty started smiling at him. Good, Regulus thought. Hopefully this was a smile of agreement.

"You're jealous," Barty said, now grinning.

"I'm not jealous of him!" Regulus almost yelled. It was as though someone had punched him in the gut. He'd never felt so insulted in his life. As if Regulus would be jealous of someone as insufferable as Yaxley.

"You are!" Barty continued, looking amused. "That's why you were giving him evils and that's why you elbowed him in the face and that's why you-"

"-I'm not jealous!" Regulus cut in, feeling annoyed again at the thought of Yaxley putting his hand on Barty's shoulder. "And I wasn't giving him 'evils', okay?"

Barty put his hands up defensively. "Okay, okay. You weren't jealous."

"Yeah," Regulus said defiantly, clutching the strap of his bag firmly and glancing around the room to make sure Yaxley was definitely gone.

"You're cute when you're jealous," Barty said quietly, and although Regulus wasn't looking at him, he could tell from his tone that he was smiling.

He felt himself flush and he refused to make eye contact. "I'm not," he mumbled. Suddenly he felt a soft pair of lips press a kiss to his cheek, and he couldn't help smiling. He turned his head to rest his forehead against Barty's. Barty reached out and took Regulus's hand, squeezing it slightly.

"You're my boyfriend, and if I say you're cute then you're cute," he said softly, intertwining their fingers. The closeness of their faces made Regulus's mind seem to go blank. He could hardly think straight. All he could think of were the tiny freckles on Barty's pale skin, dotted across his cheekbones and his nose. And those eyes that were staring so deeply into his own, it was like staring into the deepest, most magical and wondrous parts of the ocean. He dropped his gaze down to Barty's slightly parted lips. Oh, how he wanted to just close the gap between them…

"Get a room!"

The two boys sprung apart at the sound of Antonin Dolohov's voice. Dolohov was another one of their dorm-mates, and Regulus was really beginning to despise his dorm-mates at this point in time. Why did they always have to ruin all of his special moments?

They waited till he was gone and then turned back to face each other. Regulus smiled. "Call me your boyfriend again."

Barty smiled back and grabbed Regulus's hands again, stepping closer to him. He whispered, "you're my boyfriend," and bit his lip playfully.

Regulus felt as though his heart might explode. Doesn't take much to please me, Regulus thought to himself. He'd turned into one of those romantic people that he used to roll his eyes at. But when he looked at the person standing in front of him, all he wanted to do was be with him forever and ever.

His thoughts were interrupted by a sudden flash of blond that he spotted out of the corner of his eye. Yaxley was back. Regulus tried to ignore him, but he found himself involuntarily blurting out, "is Yaxley your type?" to Barty.

"Oh yeah," Barty replied, grinning. "I love my men with platinum blond hair and tight muscly butts and beautiful sparkly horse teeth. It really gets me going. Obviously."

Regulus knew it was a joke but he couldn't stop himself from pouting sadly.

"I'm kidding, Reg," Barty said, nudging Regulus.

"Well," Regulus huffed. "What is your type then?"

"Well, let's see," Barty said, pretending to be deep in thought. "I like guys with black hair. It's kind of cute when they have little dimples too. Especially when they hate their dimples…"

Regulus tried not to smile. He really did hate his dimples, truth be told. He cleared his throat. "Continue…"

"I like guys who are strong but not super muscly. Quidditch players. Especially Seekers, oh my god, Seekers. And I love short adorable guys with the biggest hearts in the world. Hmm, what else? Guys who are so sarcastic that they seem to roll their eyes more than they breathe. I like guys who make me laugh so hard that it physically hurts, but who can also comfort me when I feel like I'm going to die of sadness. I like guys who make me love being alive. And mostly, I like guys who I can call my best friend in the whole wide world."

Now it was impossible for Regulus not to smile. His cheeks were beginning to ache with how much he was smiling. "I love you," he said with a content sigh, cocking his head to the side a little and staring adoringly at Barty.

"We've only been together for two weeks, Reg," Barty said.

"And I love you," Regulus repeated. "You're my best friend. How can I not love you?"

Barty smiled and nodded. "Yeah, well, I love you too. I was just too scared to say it so quickly because I didn't want to scare you away."

"You could never scare me away," Regulus said with a laugh. "And okay, I'll admit it. Maybe I was a little bit jealous when I saw you talking to Yaxley, but I've just… never felt like this before. I've never loved someone the way I love you and sometimes I think it's too good to be true, and Yaxley is so… more out there than I am, and I'm rambling but I just never want to lose you. Especially not to someone who looks like a horse, because it would just break my-"

Regulus found himself being cut off by Barty's lips pressing against his own in a kiss that was both sweetly chaste but deeply passionate and full of love. Regulus sighed into the kiss and wrapped his arms around Barty, pulling himself as close as he could possibly get to him. Barty's arms were wrapped around Regulus's waist, and Regulus could feel him tightening his hold as though never wanting to let go of him. God, Regulus could stay like this forever, but after what seemed like an both an eternity and only five painfully short seconds, they broke apart for air.

"So," Regulus said, feeling exhilarated. "What shall we do now?"

"Well, I was thinking about hanging out with Yaxley for a little while-"

Regulus whacked his arm playfully. "Excuse me?"

"I'm joking," Barty said, taking Regulus's hand and pulling him towards the door. "Let's go and do something crazy!"

"Like what?" Regulus asked as he was being dragged from the room and out into the corridor in a half-run.

"We could sneak into Hogsmeade or do our homework or… oh, wait for it… we could mess around under the Quidditch stands!" Barty said with a smirk that made Regulus's heart rate pick up rapidly.

"Yes," Regulus said breathlessly as they neared the top of the stairs. "I would love to mess around with you. But first… can I catch my breath?"

Barty exhaled loudly and let go of Regulus's hand, leaning against the wall and clutching at the stitch in his side dramatically. "I thought you'd never ask. Phew! Boy, do I need to get fit!"

Regulus laughed and leaned against the wall with him. Falling in love with his best friend was the best thing that had ever happened to him, and he felt insanely stupid now that he thought about how he'd gotten so jealous earlier. Barty was everything to him, and he'd be blind if he couldn't see that the feeling was mutual. He just needed these moments sometimes to remind him that he had everything he could possibly want right in front of him, and it would take a lot more than some pretty dorm-mate to ruin that. In that moment, Regulus was the happiest person in the world.

~The End~