Evan Rosier
mature | sensitive content | HC | pure angst
Evan Rosier was only five when he first caught his father raping his mother. Pandora had left her favorite "friend" in the music room earlier and couldn't sleep without it. She wanted to go get it, but she was afraid of the "monsters"âor the dark, really.
At first, Evan heard crying. Thinking it was a house-elf, he thought he'd better not intervene. But at his mother's pleading voice, he halted. The door to the study was ajar, and he slowly peeked to find his mother thrown over the desk with his father behind her. His father had one hand in her hair and the other grasping her hands behind her back. Of course, he was fiveâhe didn't know what was going onâbut he did know his mother was crying and pleading and sobbing, and his father was angry and grunting and talking about "her purpose."
He turned and left, went back to Pandora's room, and handed her the teddy. That night he stayed with her and stayed awake.
Pandora was always the talkative one, and he was always the quiet oneâat least with everyone but her. Pandora would find a new color and need to tell everyone about it. But from that night, Evan began observing his father.
It was wake up at seven, breakfast at eight. At the table, his father always drawled about the day coming, and his mother always held things with too hard a grip as she muttered, "Of course, darling." He'd connected that the days where his mother didn't attend breakfastâand his father commented on it by calling her "emotional" or "unrealistic"âwere the days following the bad nights.
His mother was always strange. He and Pandora never really got along with their father. They saw him for breakfast; some days they had lunch together; most days he always came home after bedtime. But their mother was always home, and yet they always spent their time with house-elves. She was always out with her friends for tea, and if not that, she was drunk on wine all the time. And if her friends were over, he and Pandora weren't allowed out of their rooms. Even the first time he'd gotten his first nosebleed after slipping on the stairs, she just snorted and told him to have one of the elves fix it as she poured another glass. Like she refused to acknowledge them, like they were a bad reminder.
And when he began noticing his father, he began to see too much.
He was seven when he snuck out of his room one day when they had a party. He and Pandora wanted to see how the grown-ups partied and what they did or wore. Not finding his father, he left Pandora in awe behind the bannister and searched until he found him again in his study. This time there was no crying, and it wasn't his mother. He again didn't know what that was, but he knew that it wasn't good and knew it was always with women.
So from then on, where Pandora went, he went. She couldn't take a step without Evan matching hers. Even when she was in the bathroom, he stood outside.
He was nine when he went to his first gala. Like he'd gotten used to, he kept watch on his fatherâhis hands were wandering. And what was stranger was his mother's behavior. So he was more confused when he saw his mother walk out, and soon enough, the man who'd been with her followed. Making sure that Pandora was with Regulus, he followed. He didn't want it to be true, but it was. His mother was doing the same thing as his father.
That night he'd learned what having an affair meant and what it was that had been happening. And Evan grew colder on the inside. He wasn't sure if other parents were like this or not, and despite not being close with his parents, he still felt envious of those who weren't.
And then one day, his mother was pregnant. He had doubts about who the father was, so he didn't know how to feel about it. Pandora, of course, was over the moon, rambling about flowers and colors and all the toys she'd give the baby.
And when Felix was bornâdark-hairedâEvan didn't want to believe it. But somehow his mother was content and happy, until two years later. They'd attended the funeral of one of their parents' friends, and his mother had left Felix alone. He was cryingâperhaps he was too hot or felt alone or something. Evan had never admitted it, but something had stirred in him watching Felix cry. So he grabbed the crying baby and did what the elves always did. And somehow, whether it was a joke from the universe or not, Felix stopped crying and just gazed into his eyes. And Evan saw Pandora in those eyes and knew in his bones it was really his brother.
There were nights where Pandora wanted to sneak into the nursery and watch Felix or play with him, but Evan was always worried that Pandora would see what he saw.
Since then, Evan realized that family in pureblood circles was non-existent. He distrusted almost everyone and was very protective of his sisterâbecause what if someday it was her on that table?
Evan spent years trying to preserve a clean version of their family for Pandora, carefully shielding her from the worst truths. It took him four years to trust Regulus to be alone with her, despite them being cousinsâevery man had become a potential threat in his mind.
After that funeral in his third year, when he returned to Hogwarts, he finally broke down. The weight of ignoring Felix's existence, of finally understanding what his father had been doing to his mother, his horrible view of women, his fear of someone seeing Pandora that wayâthe terror that someday it could happen to her because that's what all purebloods were taught, that women were born to be bred and carry heirs. He told Regulus everything.
He feared that Regulus would tell everyone, make fun of him, brush it off, or tell him he was overreacting. But instead, for the first time in his life, he was hugged by someone who wasn't Pandora. They sat quietly that night. Regulus never brought it up again, and Evan was thankful. But one night, a week later, when their dormmates were asleep and perhaps Regulus wasn't really planning on Evan being awake, Regulus told him he was braveâthat he was looking out for his younger siblings, that he would have been honored to have an older brother like him.
Their mother died in their sixth year, and now their father didn't even bother to hide it anymore. He talked about women at the table, drank all the time, told them how their mother had been a nagger. Strange women began to sit in their mother's seat. Evan hated his father because that year, Pandora went quiet and never came out of her room. She tried to shield Felix as much as she could, but it was hardâhe was confused about what was happening. Evan was disgusted because his father casually made crude comments at the dinner table.
When his father would invite him to sit with the menâhis friendsâEvan watched how they spoke of women. His father even took him to a brothel to teach him about where women "stood" in the world.
When Evan was killed, Pandora had just had her baby and left home, cutting off all contact with her father. Felix came to her, begging her to take him in. But she stood there and cried because she couldn't raise a baby, care for a teenager, and mourn her best friend Regulus and her twin brother all at once. It was Xenophilius who tried to hold her together, and he could barely manage it.
Evan died feeling he had failed as his siblings' protectorâfailed Pandora, failed Felix, and failed Regulus.
