Written for QFLC Round 1.
Team: Wigtown Wanderers
Position: Beater 2
Prompt: Write about your chosen Death Eater going on a date
Additional Prompts: 4. (dialogue) "I really do like the pants.", 6. (word) inappropriate, 7. (dialogue) "If you don't eat your vegetables, you can't have any pudding."
Words: 1851

(Italics are flashbacks)

Personally, Barty Crouch, Jr., had always thought Regulus Black to be insane. There was nothing he could do about genetics, however, and Regulus was very nice. A complete nutter, but nice nonetheless. Good hair, radiant smile, and Barty would label himself insane, considering how he went on about his boyfriend! But Regulus went on about him, too, Barty knew, if only in his head. Barty would tease, but Regulus was nowhere to be found.

Barty swung his legs and looked around. He liked sitting in the tree, despite the occasional arse splinters, but he could see everyone and no one could see him. He liked trees in general. Regulus didn't, Barty didn't know why, but he never tried to force Reg to join him. He'd asked, of course, but Regulus didn't like heights—or the shortening of his name. Barty liked both.

He still didn't see Reg, but Reg didn't like the courtyard much. He didn't like anything much, aside from Barty himself. He'd say he wasn't pleased, but that would be a lie. Reg didn't lie to him—not as far as he knew, anyway, but Barty wouldn't question him—which was a good thing. Barty didn't like liars. Reg didn't either, and—

Oh, there he was.

The look of haughty derision on Regulus's face was easy to spot, even from so far away. It was his default expression, afterall, and Barty saw it more often than he saw any other. He doubted anyone else even knew that Reg was capable of changing his countenance.

Reg walked with the confidence he always had, black hair stationary despite the breeze, pale grey eyes fixed on nothing in particular. Barty watched as he artfully avoided the slimeball that was Snape, and as he smiled gently at an heiress whose name Barty had never bothered to learn. She was pretty, sure, if you liked that sort of thing, but Barty focused more on how quickly Regulus walked away from her than on the blush on her cheeks when he did.

Barty's tree was located at the very edge of the yard, right where it ended and the rest of the grounds began. The grounds themselves were crowded, people relaxing or studying, but the courtyard was small and welcoming. It would have been even better if the rest of the Slytherins went out into the grounds, but Barty wasn't too picky. Had he been in the grounds he would have been easily spotted. And getting Regulus out into the courtyard was hard enough.

Meanwhile, Regulus sat down on one of the tree's large roots. He opened a book that Barty didn't notice he had with him, and began leisurely reading it. Barty began to wonder if Reg didn't know he was there.

"You could come down, you know," Regulus offered after a few minutes, not looking away from the book, his voice barely above a whisper. He always spoke at barely above a whisper, Barty reflected as he clambered down. It made for some interesting conversations.

Barty sat down next to him. "Happy?"

"Tremendously."

"You're ridiculous," Barty scoffed, making himself comfortable on a root.

"But so very, very handsome," Reg replied matter-of-factly. "Isn't that what you always say?"

"I try not to," Barty discreetly brushed his fingers against Reg's hand at the book's spine. "You're arrogant enough as it is."

"Arrogant?"

Merlin, Barty loved his smirk. "Yes, arrogant. You haven't looked at me all day."

With an exaggerated flourish, Regulus turned his head and made eye contact with him. He had grey eyes, Barty noted for the second time that day. Grey, just like the clouds after a storm, light and piercing. Any lighter and they'd be white or blue, and Barty didn't like the idea of Reg with lighter eyes, because then he'd be just like any other person. Barty himself was quite ordinary, his eyes muddy and his hair bland.

"Happy?"

"Uh-huh," Barty nodded.

He liked sitting under the tree with Reg, because it was the closest he would come to it. Even then, Regulus complained of splinters and a numb arse, and threatened not to come back again. He always returned, though, and that was as close to a heart as Regulus would admit to having.

"You're ridiculous," Reg shook his head, almost fondly. "And that's inappropriate."

"What's inappropriate?"

"That."

That was a small knot in the base of the tree, unnoticeable if one was far away from it. It wasn't inappropriate, per se, but Barty guiltily looked up from the letters carved into it.

Winter holidays were upon them at last. Barty could almost skip down the hallways—all of them—knowing that he only had to go to one more lesson before he was free for the year. He didn't do any skipping, of course, because he didn't have the legs for it, but the sentiment was there.

He was in one of the aforementioned hallways, bag casually slung over one shoulder, when Regulus emerged from one of the castle's many alcoves and began walking by his side.

"You're a creep, you know," Barty commented several hallways later, when Reg was still following him.

"I'm dating you," the response was annoyed, said into his ear with an audible glare.

"You're following me."

"We're in the same class," Regulus rolled his eyes, this time with the air of a long-suffering victim.

"You're like a vampire!" Barty jumped around to face him, hands lifted to mimic claws and mouth in a tooth-revealing grin. "Except you're the weird kind, the kind that sneak into young girls' rooms and steal their knickers."

"I'm not interested in young girls," the eye roll was back. "And as I distinctly remember, you were the one that stole my pants and declared that you were going to run away with them because they are your one true love."

"Hey, I really do like those pants!" Barty protested, then stepped under Reg's arm. "But I like you more."

"You're a sweet-talker," he accused. "A pants-stealing sweet-talker."

"If you're going to be that way . . ." nonchalantly, Barty stepped out of the embrace.

"I am."

"I was going to ask you on a date, but, you know . . ."

He began walking away, quickly because Reg was fit and could catch up to him easily, and looked over his shoulder with a grin. He was surprised to see Regulus standing in the place he'd left him, mouth slightly agape.

"You know, if you did," Regulus cleared his throat, "ask, I mean. If you did ask, I'd agree."

Barty beamed at him, and led the way to the dungeons. Sure, they had double Potions, but Slughorn always went easy on them before holidays, and now he had something to look forward to.

"So where are you taking me?"

Regulus was teasing, because class had just finished, and Barty hadn't even put his quill away. But he was smiling openly, and Barty still wasn't used to it, because until a few months ago, he'd only seen Reg's frown. Barty waited until they'd said 'goodbye' to Slughorn and exited the room to reply.

"There's nowhere to take you," Barty smiled at the affronted look on Regulus's face and slapped his shoulder. "Nowhere close or that you'd enjoy."

"Then why bother?"

"Because we've been dating for a month," Barty grabbed his hand and began leading him away from the entrance to the Common Room, "and we still haven't been on a date."

"And . . . you're taking me outside?" Regulus tightened his scarf and raised it so that it covered his jaw. If you asked Barty, covering the jaw should be against the law, but no one asked Barty.

Barty nodded, then shook his head. Yes, it was outside, and yes, it was snowing, and he knew how much Reg hated the snow, but there was always Pomfrey's Pepperup Potion if they got sick.

"Seriously, where are you taking me?" Regulus demanded when they began walking through the courtyard. He'd forgotten his hat, and his hair was already wet. He knew it'd dry frizzy, and fixing it was an absolute pain.

"Come here," Barty knelt next to a tree—his tree.

The snow was already melting through his trousers, and he regretted not putting a warming charm around Regulus and himself, but at least he'd brought gloves. They were the first to walk through the snow, the first to mark the courtyard, but that was okay, because the tree was Barty's. Really, it was. He'd even asked Dumbledore how much it cost.

With his hands, he cleared the snow away from a knot on one of the roots, almost on the tree itself. It was perfectly round, like it had been carved out, but it blended into the bark around it. Holding his wand aloft for a second, Barty took one of Regulus's hands.

"You should have brought gloves," he scolded (it gave them an excuse to hold hands).

Regulus grinned, as if he knew a secret, but Barty thought that it was the same conclusion he'd just come to. He grinned back. One eye fixed on Reg, the other on the knot, Barty began moving his wand.

"What'd you do?" Regulus looked over his shoulder.

BC+RB

"You like it?" Barty turned back to Reg, away from his handiwork.

"You should put a heart around it," Regulus laughed when Barty did exactly that. "You're ridiculous."

"But I'm a lot of fun."

Barty picked them both off the ground and retraced their steps back into the castle. Their hair was soaked, and Regulus's fingers were red from the cold, but Barty couldn't stop smiling, even when Reg frowned into one of the large mirrors on the stairs.

"You should have waited until the snow stopped," Regulus complained, shaking his head to rid his hair of water.

"You don't like the snow?" Barty's shoulders slumped.

"I don't like the courtyard, either," Regulus pointed out. He snuck an arm around Barty's shoulders. "But I like you."

"It was our first date!" Barty defended, looking up from the knot. "I held your hand, and everything!"

"You took me outside into the cold and got my hair wet," Regulus closed his book, and smiled again. "But it was a lasting memory."

Barty nodded. The courtyard was almost empty, now, and it took him a minute to figure out why. By the time he'd done so, Regulus was on his feet and holding a hand out to him.

"Dinner?"

"Yup."

In the safety of the tree, Barty grabbed his boyfriend's hand. Referring to Reg as his boyfriend . . . well, that would never get old. But by the time they were in the hallways of the castle, they were only walking side by side, because they didn't dare make the relationship public. Like Reg had said, it was inappropriate.

Barty bumped Regulus on the shoulder, "Remember, if you don't eat your vegetables, you can't have any pudding!"

"You eat my vegetables, anyway."

"You need the vegetables, I'm not doing it for you."

"You are."

"I'm not."

"I'm not eating them."

"No pudding!"

"You're crazy, Crouch!"