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Regulus missed it. He thinks he always will, honestly.
At his worst he even missed the withdrawals and the comedowns that made it seem like the world was ending. The shaking and the sweating and the never ending cold that slipped into his veins whenever the drug began to trickle out of his system.
His hands clutch at his dresser, pulling out white socks marked with a black dot on the heel. Regulus thought it was the peak of discretion, ingenious of him, really.
He never wore these perticular socks, and a few years ago he figured that he should put them to better use.
The giddiness that came with the planning stage, the liquid excitement when he finally gets his hands on a few pills or tabs. He could almost taste the rush he had promised himself.
Somewhere in his chest, he could feel the shame beginning to bubble up. In a week he'd be six months clean from uppers, Pandora was so excited about it.
She had called him earlier, rambling to him over the phone about the pie she was gonna make for the milestone. Apparently, she'd called Evan and Barty about it too, along with Dorcas and Sirius. It was going to be a thing.
When Pandora —and by extension Evan and Barty, because Pandora told her brother everything and Evan was incapable of keeping his mouth shut to Barty— first found out about his addiction, she'd flipped her shit. Despite being unreasonably high out of his mind at that moment, he almost vividly remembered the un-Pandora-like nervous breakdown that happened when she saw an unfinished line on a makeup palette and powder lining his left nostril.
(A week later she told him about a friend of hers in Hogwarts who overdosed in 4th year. The poor kid found benzodiazepines in his moms bathroom and told himself he'd try it just to "see what it was like." He died 6 months later from an overdose.)
Regulus was 200£ down, now. He'd planned this a week ago, told himself it wouldn't count because he was being casual about it. Pandora would murder him, god. He hoped silently she wouldn't ever find out.
He stared at the socks, the result of those 200£ spent tucked inside. He'd been looking forward to this for a week, and lord knows Regulus wasn't known for his patience. He'd feel the bliss, the euphoric peak and eventually the hellish comedown if he could just get himself to unfold the sock.
He had no hesitations the last four times- oh fuck, had it really been four? Regulus knew he had more self control than that, there was no reason the number was anything above two.
He counted in his head, and then again, and again. He was losing the self discipline that had been ingraved in his bones, somehow.
("Addiction is a disease, Regulus. It isn't just a bad habit or hobby, it's your brain depending on something that's actively killing it. It doesn't matter how much self discipline you think you have; you're sick." A past friend had tried to intervene.
"I'm not fucking sick, jackass!" Regulus had spat, "You're making me out to be junkie. I'm not a damn junkie and I'm certainly not sick."
The hole blown through his septum and the tremors that wrecked his body told a different story. A story that Regulus would deny for years and years. A horrible, graphic story he stopped denying a year ago.)
He'd gotten the stash out of the dresser, now sitting in the floor with him parallel to it.
James found him the first time. Two months clean and Regulus just couldn't do it anymore, so he did 6 lines and almost overdosed. His fiancé (His fiancé!) was scared shitless, he barely let Regulus out if his sight for weeks.
(That was the first time someone was exposed to him, looked after him, in withdrawal for more than an hour. It was mortifying, the violent shaking and the chills pressing its icy fingers into his nerves. The mood swings were the worst part, but somehow Regulus managed to not flip out at James. He managed it instead by flipping out at everything else.)
The second and third time were both Barty, who made the mistake of neglecting to knock on his bathroom door twice.
There isn't much to the story, Barty walked in, saw drugs and damning evidence, and threatened to call Pandora. Both times were successful in getting him to sober up for at least a month.
The fourth, and what got him to 6 months clean specifically, was when Remus found him.
After graduating and getting to know Remus more after Hogwarts, Regulus learned Remus barely did anything alone. It was a complete 180 from the Remus he got to know in school. Remus often looked lonely back then, Regulus had just assumed it was self imposed. In the later years , Sirius was nearly always there. Regulus could spot Remus reading outside, and he'd only have to look to Remus' lap to spot Sirius talking animatedly about who-knows-what.
When Remus walked into Regulus' bedroom months and months ago, looking on the floor and seeing a cut-up straw and little ziplock bag with Regulus sporting a bloody nose, Regulus had resigned to his fate. The panic was dulled in the face of the high, but it had shimmered for a second in his throat. It wouldn't change the outcome, nothing would.
Sirius Orion Black, his older brother and best friend when he was a child. His brother who left him when he was fourteen, the brother who reached out at twenty three. When Sirius looked and saw that cut up straw and Regulus' moon-sized pupils; something snapped.
Again, he was too high to remember it in full HD, but Sirius refused to speak to him for a month after that. Remus texted James to tell Regulus that they changed their lock, like a fucked up game of face-the-consequences-of-your-actions telephone. Remus didn't text Regulus about it himself, and that was more than enough evidence needed for him to know that he wasn't welcome until he was actually better, not just trying.
Regulus still has the old key sirius gave him to his and Remus' apartment. It won't fit the new lock, and Regulus has the new one on a landyard Barty threw at him when he saw Regulus pull out a banged up key ring once.
He tells himself its for nostalgia.
And-
And he's still staring at the socks, at his stash. He always hated the word stash, made him sound desperate. He used the word "stock," instead. Now, he uses the word stash anyways, because apparently it's healthy to admit that Regulus was desperate.
He was doing so well. Him and Sirius were talking again, and Pandora isn't checking in to see if he's alive as much as she was a month ago. He hasn't even physically touched the drugs, just the socks, but it feels like a relapse anyways. The hot shame in his gut charring his insides, he felt rotten.
He should call someone. And probably flush the stash too, while he's at it. Christ, he had been planning this for days. Days!
"Reg- babe?" Regulus nearly jumped through the ceiling as James' voice sounded through their room. He didn't even hear the door creak open, and the hinges on said door probably haven't been oiled since the 1800's.
It was almost funny, the way he still felt like a deer in headlights, despite the near constant reassurance that his support team would be there if he reached out. Does this even count? He was caught in the act anyway, aborted plan or not.
"Oh- mi vida, i know that look. What's in the sock?"
"Christ- James! Jamie, mon cœur, uhm, hi?" Whatever higher power was out there, they had it out for him. He didn't even get the drugs out of the damn socks and he was already caught. "I'm having a- dilemma? Does this count as reaching out?"
"Depends on the situation, and if you already took anything."
"I've been sitting here since 6pm? Haven't touched it, I was contemplating, sure, but it's untouched." Glancing at the clock, It was now 9pm.
Dejectedly, he thought, Three hours of my life wasted on drugs anyway, and I wasn't even high.
"I'm flushing it."
"No, wait-" He shot up, momentarily forgetting that this was James. He wasn't going to lay hands on anyone for drugs, he swore that nearly half a decade ago. Especially not his fiancé, his James.
"Regulus, I don't care how much money you spent on it. I don't care if there was a 'good deal,' I don't care. I'm not letting you do this to yourself." The sock-stash was in his lover's hands all too quick, and suddenly, he was alone.
In the back of his mind, Regulus knew James was just going to flush it. He wasn't being malicious, not even close to it. He would be right back, and everything would be fine again. Regulus was fine.
His therapist —the one Dorcas bullied him into seeing after one too many unexplained nosebleeds and 'random' cases of the sniffles— said he liked to run his mind around in circles when he begins to spiral, as some sort of last ditch effort of control. He's inclined to trust her. She's seen and heard enough of his spirals to know.
Look for a distraction, she'd say. But, the distraction is gone. It's being flushed, and somehow he 's supposed to think it's a good thing.
It's good, and Regulus is fine.
It wasn't good. Regulus was anything but fine.
He wanted Sirius, Sirius could fix this. He knows how to snap him out of his mind, but Sirius probably hates him now. He almost broke the one thing he promised not to do.
He feels the tears well up as he curls into a ball. He wants James. He'd like his fiancé, too, please and thank you universe.
It feels like an eternity before he feels hands on him. It takes a remarkable amount of self restraint that he honestly didn't think he had in him to not swing on instinct. Really, the only reason he doesn't is because distantly he could hear James' voice.
"Ricitos, there you are." And Regulus broke. James's was so soft, no matter how much Regulus didn't deserve it.
"I almost- James, I almost relapsed. I'm a week away from being six months clean, and I tried to ruin it. Je suis désolé, fuck, I'm sorry-" Regulus half babbled in french and half cried in english, a mountain of stress crashing down that he didn't even know was there. He only half registered what he was saying; he knew he mentioned Pandora at one point, and this wouldn't be a Regulus Breakdown if Sirius' name wasn't mentioned somewhere in the aftermath (if not multiple times, for multiple reasons).
James murmured comforts that hr didn't need to hear to truly feel, and Regulus cried until tears refused to fall. He felt nearly itchy, his skin felt peeled back.
Regulus feels his eyes droop. He feels James, his wonderfully sweet James, rub his hip in a soothing, circular motion. They fit against each other perfectly, they always have. James was warm and his breathing was nice to listen to, his chest rising and falling. A strangle thing to find comfort in, sure, but Regulus just liked seeing signs of life in his fiancé. James' blood was circulating, air was flowing through his lovely lungs, and he was healthy and alive.
He feels the tension in the crevices of his soul bleed out, and he feels himself falling asleep in James' arms.
Regulus knew he was safe in James' arms, even from himself. He really should reach out more often.