my roman empire is james openly having a crush on regulus as he did on lily in canon. this fandom has forgotten the sheer comedic gold of james repeatedly asking regulus out in increasingly ridiculous ways.
just imagine- james standing on the gryffindor table in the Great Hall at breakfast singing lover by taylor swift on the top of his voice with a mic directly at regulus. reg body binds him and the next day he threatens to castrate him if he keeps pulling these stunts. james finds it hot though.
and to add angst to my headcanon james grows out of his crush for reg and instead pursues lily. reg starts to like him back but it's too late jily have gotten together. his heartbreak is one of the reasons he doesn't tell anyone he's going to the cave.
months later when james finds out about it from the news he goes to the lake outside cause he knows it used to be reg's favourite spot to read and cries his eyes out thinking about what could have been, about a boy with sparkingly grey eyes, soft black hair, and a lopsided smile that used to make his whole day and still would.
but it's too late, it's too late.
the whole next week he's inconsolable, even by lily. him and sirius get too drunk to be safe way too many times, but the huge aching gap in his chest never leaves. he used to love lily once, but now he doesn't think he can love anyone.
he and lily have harry in a last ditch attempt to repair their relationship, and it works for a while, but james just doesn't care anymore and it's not working. he spends his last few days miserable, only occasionally pretending for harry, not being to get thoose dam grey eyes out of his head.
that fateful halloween, just as the avada kedavra hits him, his last thought is of how beautiful reg looked as he smiled, of his achingly gorgeous cheekbones, of his long nimble fingers, of regulus regulus regulus regulus regulus regulus regulus regulus regulus regulus regulus regulusregulusregulusregulusregulusregulusregulus
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