C. New Year's Eve

                                    

                                          
Chapter Notes: chapter 100 (it's another long one)!! it's kind of insane to me that i've written this much (the total word count is almost 500,000!!) and i'm so glad that you guys enjoy it!! your comments brighten up every single one of my days, and i am more grateful for all of you than i know how to express!! 
CW: depression, mention of suicidal thoughts, & homophobic slurs
                          
Regulus spent the next few days ignoring everyone aside from Kreacher. He stayed in his bed, stared forward blankly, and didn't even get up to go to the bathroom. His mind was racing with thoughts of Christian, and thoughts of existentialism, and thoughts of just giving up and never leaving his bed ever again - just letting himself starve and waste away. 
                          
Regulus had given up on trying to distract himself from the harmful thoughts that filled his mind, and it just made them that much worse. Regulus was finding it harder and harder to convince himself that this was nothing but a rut. Because it wasn't just a bad rut, was it? It wasn't just a temporary dip in his mental health that would right itself with no effort. It was worse - it was much, much worse. But he didn't want to accept that it was worse, and that was his problem, wasn't it? How could he get better if he didn't even want to accept that there was anything wrong in the first place?
                          
Kreacher had to come let Artemis into Regulus's room several times. Regulus loved Artemis - he really did - but he could not find it in himself to let her into the room when she would sit on the ledge outside of his window and peck to no end. 
                          
She brought Regulus four letters in the span of those three days. All of them were from Christian, and all of them were tossed on Regulus's bedside table by Kreacher to go unread. 
                          
Regulus felt bad. The more he thought about what had happened between him and Christian, the worse he felt. He had snapped at Christian when all he was was concerned. But, even with that thought in Regulus's head, there was still a part of his mind that was telling him that he had done the right thing. 
                          
He's going to leave you anyways. You pushed him away so that he won't have the opportunity to hurt you. You did the right thing. 
                          
But he still felt sad. He felt a sense of loss that he had never felt before - he didn't even have anything to compare it to. Well, he supposed that the closest thing that he had was when he had first discovered that Sirius had been sorted Gryffindor. He had felt an aching in his chest that day because he knew that Sirius was gone. The second that the hat had put him in a house to be adorned by red and gold, Sirius was gone. 
                          
And now, so was Christian. Because Regulus had done the thing that he was so afraid of, and he had pushed him away. It was only a matter of time until he pushed away Barty, and Carson and Gillian (though, could he even push them away? They had written him once since what they had done and never again. Had they already left him, too?), and what little bit of Sirius that he had back. He didn't want to push them away, but he knew that it was inevitable. 
                          
Regulus, as it turned out, just wasn't a very likable person at all.
                          
On the morning of 31 December, 1975, Regulus had finally fallen asleep. It wasn't peaceful by any means, but it was rest. It was rest that he had not felt in days, aside from the occasional drifting off. It appeared that he had moved away from the period of constant sleep into a time of constant restlessness, exhaustion, and insomnia. 
                          
However, he was awoken by a very loud knocking on his door. He opened his eyes just in time to see the blurry figure of his mother emerging through the previously opened door. She looked at Regulus with an expression of impassivity, which was a step up from the distaste. 
                          
"Regulus," she said, trying to be sure that she had his attention. 
                          
"Mother," he greeted her, his voice the hoarse croak that it usually was when he awoke from sleep.