It all began in the first year itself. Professor Flitwick had been practically glowing after the first Charms lesson of the year. Standing atop his stack of books, he clapped his hands together with obvious delight as two feathers floated neatly across the classroom, one hovering above your desk and the other above the desk of the Gryffindor boy sitting a few rows away. It had taken most of the class several attempts just to make their feathers twitch, yet somehow the two of you had managed the Levitation Charm on your very first try.

He announced that Slytherin would be awarded ten points and Gryffindor five, since you were quicker than the boy.

The room went quiet before the whispering started. The eleven year olds were quite vicious without meaning to be, murmuring that of course the Slytherin girl got more points, some arguing that it was actually the boy who levitated the feather first.

Choi Seungcheol did not help. He turned to his friends with his chin tipped up, still frustrated about losing by such a small margin, although it was no competition, and said, loud enough for you to hear, "Must be nice. Wish my parents could buy me House Cup points too."

You turned to look at the arrogant boy. “Don’t be so bitter for losing. You’ll catch up to me,” You smiled sweetly at him, “in a year or two”. A few nearby students laughed and Seungcheol's ears turned bright red almost instantly.

The lesson ended before either of you said another word, but by lunchtime the two of you were already racing each other through the corridors toward Herbology because neither wanted to arrive second. That’s where your rivalry started.

For you, it became about proving that every mark, every compliment, every point beside Slytherin's hourglass had been earned. For Seungcheol, it became about refusing to let the infuriating Slytherin beat him without a fight.

By seventh year, your rivalry had become part of Hogwarts itself. Students expected arguments whenever your paths crossed. Professors instinctively called on someone else whenever both of your hands went up at once. First-years who had never witnessed how it started still knew not to seat the two of you together.

Nobody remembered that it had begun with five House points, one careless accusation, and an equally childish comeback from two stubborn eleven-year-olds who had been far too competitive for their own good.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

By seventh year, both you and Seungcheol had earned prefect badges, much to the surprise of absolutely no one. There had never been a shortage of academic excellence, rule-following, or painfully stubborn determination between the two of you, Unfortunately, the prefect rota cared very little about personal grudges and every few weeks, your names inevitably appeared on the same patrol schedule, assigned to the same stretch of castle for the evening.

Both of you had an unspoken rule of never acknowledging the other during patrols.

That night was no different.

You had already finished checking the eastern staircase on the fourth floor when you rounded the corner and spotted another pool of wandlight moving steadily toward you. Seungcheol emerged a moment later, one hand tucked into the pocket of his robes while the other lazily held his wand at his side. His shoulders visibly sagged the instant he recognized you, accompanied by an exaggerated sigh that was entirely unnecessary and, excessively irritating for you.

"Brilliant," he muttered under his breath, slowing his pace just enough to fall beside you instead of walking ahead. "Of all the prefects they could've paired me with tonight..."

You didn't bother looking at him as you continued down the corridor, your own wand casting long shadows across the stone walls.

"I was about to say the same thing."

Silence lasted exactly half a corridor before the argument started over something so insignificant that, later, neither of you could remember who had actually begun it.

"Ten points was generous," Seungcheol said, hand cutting through the air before he landed a point he considered unanswerable. "That cauldron fire was entirely Jeonghan's fault."

"You weren't even watching," you shot back.

"I'm saying your House gets away with far more than mine ever does," Seungcheol argued, turning enough to face you properly now instead of watching where he was walking. His eyebrows drew together, and every sentence came accompanied by another emphatic gesture of his free hand. "McGonagall would've deducted twice the points if one of my housemates had done half the things your lot gets away with."

You came to an abrupt stop, forcing him to halt a step later when he realized you were no longer walking beside him.

"You can't honestly expect professors to reward Gryffindors for setting things on fire every other lesson and for being obnoxiously loud" you replied, folding your arms across your chest.

"Name one instance where we set something on fire" He let out a disbelieving laugh.

"Oh I can name more than one, how about that day when your team was being showoffs and...”

Neither of you noticed the hurried footsteps approaching from around the corner.

Two third-year students rounded the bend so quickly they nearly collided with both of you. They froze the moment your wandlight illuminated their faces, every ounce of guilty panic written plainly across their expressions. One still clutched a box of Honeydukes sweets beneath his robes while the other looked as though she was already calculating how many House points she was about to lose.

You instinctively reached for your wand.

Seungcheol had already opened his mouth to ask why they were out after curfew.

Before you could get a word out, the boy panicked and flung a badly aimed Confundus Charm to buy himself time to run. It should have missed you both completely. Instead it caught the corner where you and Seungcheol stood close together mid argument, wands raised, both your defensive instincts flaring at the same instant.

Two defensive charms collided with the already unstable spell.

Magic ricocheted violently through the narrow corridor.

For a second, white light bounced between stone walls and polished wand tips until it became too bright to distinguish where one spell ended and another began.

Something pulled sharply behind your ribs, the corridor lurched beneath your feet and then everything disappeared.

You woke on your knees on cold stone, and the first wrong thing you noticed was your own hands. They were too big. The knuckles were broader, and there was a thin scar across one that you had never had in your life. You turned them over slowly in the wandlight, and when you finally opened your mouth to ask what had happened, the voice that came out was not yours. It was lower, rougher and unmistakably Choi Seungcheol's.

Across the corridor, another figure had reached exactly the same realization.

Your own face stared back at you, impossibly pale beneath the flickering torchlight. Seungcheol—wearing your body—lifted trembling hands to his face before abruptly grabbing at his own sleeves, then his hair, then his jaw, as though touching enough familiar features would somehow force everything back into place.

"What did you do?" he demanded.

You jerked upright so quickly you nearly lost your balance.

"What did I do?" The disbelief that surged through you almost drowned out the unfamiliar sound of his voice coming from your own throat. "You were the one waving your wand around like an idiot."

"My defensive spell was perfectly controlled."

"You call that controlled?"

"It would've been if yours hadn't gotten in the way."

You took a step toward him.

He immediately stepped forward as well.

The two of you stood almost chest to chest, each wearing the other's face while glaring with exactly the same stubborn determination.

"Fix it."

"You fix it."

"I didn't cause it."

"Neither did I."

The younger students had vanished long ago, saving themselves from detention, oblivious to the catastrophe they caused and left behind.

The corridor filled instead with overlapping accusations, increasingly ridiculous theories, and several failed attempts to convince yourselves this would be fine. You cast revealing spells on one another.

It wasn't until nearly twenty minutes later, when every spell either failed or confirmed the impossible, that the arguments finally began to lose momentum.

The silence settled heavily between you and now you both couldn’t unfortunately deny it anymore.

"Tell me this isn't happening," Seungcheol said, in your voice, sounding faintly sick.

"I wish I could," you said back, in his.

You were standing inside Choi Seungcheol's body.

And he was standing inside yours.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

You moved to an empty third floor classroom because neither of you could stomach the thought of walking into the hospital wing like this. The shame of the truth felt worse than the swap itself.

"If anyone finds out," you said, arms folded across a chest that wasn't yours, "my entire reputation is finished, Seungcheol. Gone."

"You think I want people knowing this either?" he said, pacing in your body with none of your usual composure. "I'm the Gryffindor Captain. I can't be the bloke who got soul swapped with you because we were bickering after curfew."

You shudder inwardly. "Then we tell no one. We fix it ourselves."

He stopped pacing and looked at you, weighing it. "Every evening. Third floor classroom. We trade whatever the other needs to know to survive being us for a day."

"Fine."

"Fine."

He stuck his hand out to shake on it, oddly formal for someone who lived his life informally, and you looked down at your borrowed hand and shook it, telling yourself this would be over within the week.

Spoiler, it was not over within the week.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

Living inside Choi Seungcheol's life turned out to be nothing like you had imagined it, and you had imagined it plenty, in the resentful corner of your mind. You had to sit through a Quidditch strategy meeting that ran forty five minutes long, because the captain was expected to walk the team through three formations for the match against Slytherin, and you had to bluff your way through it with fragments of Quidditch knowledge you had absorbed as an unwilling bystander over the years.

You noticed things you had never let yourself notice. Seungcheol's roommate, a broad shouldered Chaser named Mingyu, came to find him after dinner with a folded letter from home clutched too tight in his hand.

"It's about my grandma," Mingyu admitted, sitting heavily on the edge of a bed that wasn now yours temporarily. "The Healers still don't know what's wrong."

You didn't know what Seungcheol usually said in moments like this. You said the only thing that felt honest. "Do you want to talk about it, or do you want me to distract you until practice?"

Mingyu blinked at you, his shoulders sagging with relief. "Distraction. Definitely distraction."

Later, alone, you found a battered notebook in Seungcheol's trunk with every player's birthday written in cramped handwriting, little reminders beside each one. Chan, nervous flying in rain, check on him before matches. Soonyoung, keep away from firewhiskey. You sat on his bed for a long time with it open on your knees.

Seungcheol, meanwhile, discovered your life and admitted, begrudgingly, during one of your evening meetings at the Etiquette Club, that it was way too exhausting.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

"You finished three second years' essays with them tonight," he said, dropping into the chair across from you, in the third floor classroom. "Then you did your own. It's past midnight."

"That's Tuesday for you," you said simply shrugging.

"Does anyone ever ask if you're tired?" he said, abruptly

You looked up at him, startled, and said nothing at all. You picked at a loose thread on your sleeve until he let the silence swallow the question back down.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

The Yule Ball rehearsals turned into a disaster almost immediately. You had been the seventh-year dance instructor for weeks before the swap, a position earned through years in the Ballroom and Etiquette Club, and trapped in Seungcheol's body you still had to run them. Which meant you had to rely on Seungcheol to demonstrate steps with his dance skills, or lack thereof, in front of the entire seventh year.

The true catastrophe was Seungcheol, wearing your body, attempting to dance. He trod on your partner's feet twice in one turn. He counted the beats under his breath in a way you never would. His partner, Junhui, who had been your friend since third year, kept glancing at your borrowed face with growing confusion, unable to reconcile the girl he knew, precise in everything, with whoever kept stepping on his shoes.

You dragged Seungcheol aside the second rehearsal ended.

"You are destroying seven years of reputation in one afternoon," you hissed at him.

"I'm doing my best," he hissed back, looking like his pride was wounded rather than sorry. "Dancing was never exactly my area of expertise, if you hadn't noticed."

"Clearly."

You stood there a moment, both furious, both cornered, until the solution landed on you out of pure desperation. "We dance with each other instead. I lead, since apparently my muscle memory came with me. You just follow closely enough that no one notices."

He stared at you like you'd suggested something far worse than it was. Even if neither of you wanted this, it’s not like you had a choice either.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

The rehearsals that followed took up more of your patience than either of you had to spare. You corrected the position of Seungcheol's hands, adjusted the distance between your bodies, told him to lower his shoulders.

"Stop muttering the count," you said, for what felt like the tenth time. "It throws off the rhythm for both of us."

"My feet ache," he complained. "You've had me bent into shapes no human spine was designed for."

"Then stop arguing and hold the position."

"You're impossibly particular, you know that?"

"Particular is the only reason either of us survives this without becoming laughing stock."

It became its own kind of routine, the same rhythm your rivalry always had, except now it put you close enough to feel warmth radiating off borrowed skin.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

The Quidditch match against Slytherin arrived inevitably. You had spent the week before it inventing excuses, a headache, a sudden allergy, praying it rained hard enough, because the truth was one you had hidden from almost everyone you knew. You were terrified of heights.

"You've got this," Seungcheol told you, the night before, with a false certainty. It just made your stomach twist.

You wanted, badly, to tell him the truth right then but your throat closed around it. Your pride didn’t allow you to say that. "Right," you said instead. "Of course."

The match itself was the worst hour of your life. The moment the broom left the ground your vision narrowed and your chest locked up, your hands white knuckled on the handle, your breath coming in short useless pulls you prayed nobody below could see. You forced yourself to stay in the air anyway, teeth clenched against a fear that felt like drowning.

Gryffindor still lost, badly, and your stomach dropped the moment the final whistle blew.

Seungcheol found you in the corridor outside the changing rooms afterward, his hands fists at his sides. "You cost us that match," he said. "Do you understand what today meant?"

"I tried," you said, eyes stinging, voice cracking on the word. "You have no idea what you're asking of me."

"Then explain it to me."

You couldn't. Neither of you listened to the other, and you parted with the unresolved fury hanging between you, and did not speak again for two days.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

It was Jun who unraveled everything, without meaning to. Seungcheol, still wearing your body, asked to meet him near the Astronomy Tower to finalise the dance partners list and get it over with.

Jun blinked at him. "Why there? You've always hated heights. You nearly fainted on the Tower stairs in third year, remember?"

The words landed on Seungcheol like a slap. His stomach dropped, and the pieces of the last two days slid into place at once, your excuses, your locked shoulders on the broom, the shake in your hands during the match. "Right," Seungcheol managed. "Forgot about that."

"Are you all right?" Jun asked, slowing when he noticed the unusual tension in your shoulders. Before you could answer, he seemed to remember something else and gestured vaguely toward the staircase. "Oh—and Seungcheol was looking for you earlier. I saw him heading toward Professor McGonagall's office. "

Seungcheol's chest went cold at the thought of what that might mean.

For a brief moment, he wondered whether you had somehow discovered a way to reverse the swap without telling him. The thought barely lasted a second before another possibility settled heavily in his chest.

You were going to tell someone.

By the time he reached the corridor outside Professor McGonagall's office, the door had already been left slightly ajar. He stopped just short of the doorway, his footsteps instinctively quiet against the stone floor.

Inside the office, you sat opposite Professor McGonagall, still wearing his face.

Gone was the composed certainty you usually carried through the corridors of Hogwarts. Your shoulders had lost their usual rigid posture, your hands resting tightly clasped together in your lap as though you were afraid they might begin shaking if you let them move. You carefully recounted everything from the beginning: the patrol assignment, the collision of defensive spells, and the impossible moment the two of you had awakened inside one another's bodies.

Professor McGonagall listened without interruption. She did not speak once.

She merely folded her hands together atop her desk, her expression growing steadily more severe as every passing minute confirmed that two seventh-year prefects had concealed an unstable magical accident from the faculty for weeks.

Only when you finally fell silent did she rise from her chair.

She walked slowly around the desk before stopping directly in front of you, her gaze unwavering beneath the brim of her pointed hat.

"I have watched the two of you spend years attempting to outdo one another," she said. "I expected competitiveness. I did not expect recklessness."

The silence stretched.

When she spoke again, her voice softened almost imperceptibly.

"Tell me.. why did neither of you come sooner?"

Your fingers tightened together until your knuckles paled beneath Seungcheol’s skin.

Then, without looking up, you answered quietly.

"Because I thought we could fix it ourselves." You drew in a slow, uneven breath. "...And because I didn't want anyone thinking we'd been alone together after curfew for any reason other than patrol."

A faint, almost exasperated sigh escaped the professor.

"You two truly are young fools."

The smallest corner of your mouth twitched despite yourself before disappearing just as quickly.

After another moment, your composure finally cracked.

"I also..." Your voice faltered for the first time all evening. "I made things worse."

Professor McGonagall remained silent, giving you the space to continue.

"I played the Quidditch match in his place."

You swallowed hard.

"I could barely breathe the moment the broom left the ground. Every time I looked down, I thought I was going to fall. I wanted to quit before the match even started." Your gaze stayed fixed on the floor. "But I knew how much Quidditch means to him. I knew what that team expected from their captain. I couldn't let everyone down before the whistle had even blown."

Your hands trembled faintly.

"I still let them down."

His hand remained suspended beside the doorframe, fingers curling slowly against the cold stone as every piece of the previous week's argument rearranged itself inside his mind.

Guilt settled heavily in his chest. He wanted to step through the doorway. He wanted to apologize.

Professor McGonagall notices him linger near the door, “Mr. Choi, how lovely of you to join us”

He walks in, still looking like you, and stands beside you, ready for anything that she might say to you both now.

Professor McGonagall regarded the two of you for a long, measured moment. "I am less concerned," she began, her voice calm enough to be unsettling, "with how this happened than I am with what you chose to do afterward."

You lowered your head.

"You are both prefects. Students whom this school trusted to exercise sound judgment." She paused, allowing the weight of her words to settle over the room before continuing. "Instead, the two of you decided that your pride was more important than informing a professor about exceptionally dangerous, poorly understood magic. Had this curse worsened? Had either of you sustained permanent magical damage? Had one of you become trapped? You would have had no one to blame but yourselves."

Every sentence landed heavier than the last.

She sighed quietly, some of the sharpness leaving her expression.

"I believe the worst lesson has already been learned," she said at last, folding her hands neatly before her. "Though I sincerely hope that should either of you find yourselves involved in impossible magic again, your first instinct will be to seek help from a professor instead of allowing your pride to dictate your judgment."

Neither of you argued. There was very little left to say.

After a brief silence, she reached for a parchment on her desk and made a neat note with a flourish of her quill.

"As Head of Gryffindor and Deputy Headmistress, I cannot simply overlook your astonishing lapse in judgment. Consider yourselves both assigned to detention this Saturday evening."

You and Seungcheol exchanged the briefest glance before instinctively looking away again.

Professor McGonagall noticed.

"Together," she added without looking up from her parchment. "Professor Hagrid has requested assistance gathering medicinal plants from the edge of the Forbidden Forest. Since the two of you seem determined to solve your problems without adult supervision, perhaps an evening completing unpleasant work under proper supervision will remind you why rules exist in the first place."

The faintest trace of embarrassment settled across both your faces.

"Yes, Professor," you both answered almost simultaneously.

Only then did Professor McGonagall rise from behind her desk.

"Now," she said, retrieving her wand, "let us remedy the problem that should have been brought to me weeks ago."

Within the hour, she led both of you back to the corridor where the accident had begun. The stone floor felt strangely familiar beneath your knees as you and Seungcheol faced one another once more, neither quite able to hold the other's gaze for more than a heartbeat. Professor McGonagall's wand moved in slow, deliberate arcs through the air. Ancient incantations echoed softly around the empty room as thin strands of silver light unfurled from the tip of her wand, wrapping around each of you before gradually weaving together into a single glowing thread.

The sensation arrived almost immediately. A sharp pull somewhere behind your ribs and a wave of dizziness that made the hallway tilt for only a fraction of a second.

Then, just as suddenly, everything settled.

When you opened your eyes again, your own hands rested against your knees.

You flexed your fingers once, then again, relief quietly spreading through your chest as familiar muscles responded exactly as they should.

Across from you, he mirrored the movement almost unconsciously before running a hand over his own face, as though reassuring himself that every feature belonged where it was supposed to.

The body swap was over.

The silence that followed, however, was far more difficult to undo.

You were looking up at Seungcheol through your own eyes again, and he was looking back at you through his, and everything you now knew about each other sat between you like a third person in the room

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

Saturday evening, Professor McGonagall’s punishment arrived far sooner than either of you would have liked.

You both made your way down the sloping path from the castle toward the edge of the Forbidden Forest, where Hagrid was already waiting beside an overflowing wooden cart. The gamekeeper greeted you with his usual warmth, though the look he gave the pair of you carried just enough amusement to suggest Professor McGonagall had been very clear about why two seventh-year prefects had found themselves serving detention together.

"Moondew an' Moonlace don't collect themselves," Hagrid said cheerfully, thrusting a woven basket into Seungcheol's hands before passing another to you. "Stick close, keep yer lanterns high, an' don't wander off. Most creatures'll leave yeh alone if yeh've got the sense not ter bother 'em first."

You exchanged a brief glance with Seungcheol. After everything the two of you had already survived together, gathering magical plants almost sounded... peaceful.

The forest was quieter than you had expected. Damp earth softened your footsteps beneath thick roots and fallen leaves. Hagrid moved steadily several paces ahead, his lantern swinging gently from one enormous hand as he occasionally called back instructions about which plants to avoid disturbing.

You and Seungcheol settled into an easy rhythm. He reached higher branches before they struck your face as the path narrowed. Every so often your baskets bumped together when both of you reached for the same plant, earning nothing more than a brief glance before one of you wordlessly stepped aside.

It was... strangely comfortable.

Then, inevitably, you spotted a cluster of silver blossoms growing just beyond the edge of the path.

"They're right there," you murmured, already stepping over a thick tree root before either Hagrid or Seungcheol had the chance to object.

You had barely taken two careful steps into the undergrowth when something darted through the bushes several feet to your left and the sound was sudden enough to make you aware.

Branches shook violently and leaves scattered.

Your foot came down awkwardly on a patch of loose moss hidden beneath the fallen leaves as the ground disappeared beneath you. A sharp twist shot through your ankle before you had time to catch yourself.

"Seungcheol—"

The word had barely left your mouth before he was moving. He covered the distance almost instantly.

One arm wrapped firmly around your waist before your back could hit the ground while his other hand caught your wrist, steadying both of you with enough force that the momentum carried you several steps backward. His grip tightened instinctively as he turned, positioning himself between you and whatever had moved through the trees, your body pressed securely against his chest while his wand lifted in one smooth motion.

For one suspended heartbeat, neither of you breathed.

The bushes rustled again. Then...

A plump brown rabbit bounded lazily out from beneath the undergrowth, paused, twitched its nose at the two of you, and disappeared into the trees without the slightest concern.

Both remained stunned in place, holding onto each other, more from instinct than intention. His breathing was slightly uneven, the rise and fall of his chest impossible to ignore from where you stood pressed against him.

Somewhere behind you, Hagrid let out an amused chuckle. "Jus' a rabbit," he called without looking up from the herbs he was collecting. "Scared the pair o' yeh good, did it?" he said before returning to his work, evidently deciding the pair of you required no rescuing after all.

Neither of you answered. Your eyes met for one unbearably long moment, and the forest seemed to disappear entirely.

His gaze flickered briefly to your face before darting away again, the tips of his ears colouring almost instantly. He cleared his throat, taking a careful step backward as though sudden movements might somehow make the moment more awkward than it already was. The hand at your waist loosened reluctantly, though it lingered just long enough to ensure you had found your footing before letting go altogether.

"I..." He exhaled quietly, rubbing the back of his neck with a faintly sheepish expression. "I may have overreacted." He dropped his hand back by his side and you notice something dark on it.

"Wait." You reached for his wrist before you decided to. He frowned in confusion as you turned his hand over, revealing a thin cut across two swollen knuckles, blood already beading where he had clearly caught the rough bark of a branch when he lunged for you.

"When did this happen?"

Seungcheol glanced down as though seeing the injury for the first time.

"Oh." His answer was maddeningly unconcerned.

"It’s nothing” He gave a careless shrug

"It's bleeding, Seungcheol." You caught his wrist before he could wave you off and turned his hand over gently in the lantern light, digging in your bag for the small tin of dittany you carried out of habit.

He sighed but stopped resisting, letting his fingers relax in your grip while you dabbed the dittany carefully over the scrape. He barely flinched, though you caught the way his jaw tightened and then slowly eased again as the sting faded, and neither of you said anything for a while, your focus fixed entirely on his hand.

His focus however, was fixed entirely on you.

"You know," he said after a long moment, his voice noticeably quieter than before, "you really don't have to fuss over me."

“How could I let go of the opportunity of holding this favour over you?” you said as you keep gently cleaning his wound.

He shakes his head in amusement.

You bottled the dittany and put it back into your bag before getting up. Then you shifted your own weight again, forgetting for a moment which foot you weren't supposed to be standing on, and the same sharp pain shot up your ankle, pulling a hiss through your teeth before you could stop it.

His gaze dropped immediately to your foot, his expression changing so quickly it was almost impossible to follow. Lingering amusement vanished first. It was replaced by concern. A heartbeat later, concern disappeared beneath familiar irritation.

"You twisted your ankle, didn’t you?" he said, his voice quieter than before, though no less firm.

"I’m fine."

"Yeah right” He didn't wait for you to argue further. He crouched, testing your ankle with careful fingers, and when he straightened up he simply lifted you off your feet entirely, one arm under your knees and the other braced firm behind your back.

"What are you doing! Put me down." You exclaim. "I can walk."

"Can’t let you hold something over me” he said, and you could hear the grin in it even without looking up to confirm it, “Consider this as your favour repaid”

You looped an arm around his neck for balance only, you told yourself firmly, and let him carry you back toward the castle.

"Don’t you dare make me fall," you said, trying to look anywhere but at his impossibly close face.

“I just might” He finally set you down only after Madam Pomfrey's door came into view.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

You had expected returning to your own bodies would restore everything to the way it had always been.

Another spoiler, it did not.

For several days, neither of you seemed capable of behaving normally around the other. Seven years of effortless rivalry had suddenly become awkward. Every encounter carried an unfamiliar hesitation, as though both of you had forgotten the roles you had spent years playing.

When your paths crossed in the corridors, your first instinct was still to reach for some familiar remark, yet the words often stalled before they reached your tongue. If your eyes met across the Great Hall, one of you always looked away first, only for the other to do the same a heartbeat later, both pretending to have found something infinitely more interesting elsewhere.

The body swap had ended, but it had left behind far more than either of you had bargained for. You knew the quiet burdens Seungcheol carried beneath his easy confidence, the responsibilities he accepted without complaint, and the countless kindnesses he performed when nobody thought to look.

He knew the impossible expectations you placed upon yourself, the exhaustion hidden beneath your composure, and the fears you had guarded so fiercely for years. Those pieces of each other lingered stubbornly between every conversation, making it impossible to return to the comfortable certainty of simply being rivals.

Seungcheol resumed his habit of appearing beside you at every opportunity, though his teasing had changed. He no longer cared nearly as much about House points or exam scores. Instead, he found endless amusement in pointing out habits only he knew you had, making observations that would have sounded ordinary to anyone else but left you uncomfortably aware of the weeks he had spent living your life. Every comment earned him an exasperated look, every grin another reluctant retort, yet somehow the conversations lasted longer than they needed to.

You told yourself he was simply impossible to ignore, an arrogant git.

Yet you had begun noticing that arrogant git too.

Your gaze searched for him before Quidditch matches without conscious thought. When prefect duties were assigned, you found yourself checking the rota for his name before folding the parchment away. If he wandered into the library while you were studying, you invariably looked up from your book, only to look away the moment your eyes met. Whenever he fell into step beside you in the corridors, you complained out of habit, yet your pace unconsciously slowed just enough that he never had to catch up.

Truth being said, you both were being idiots who were now arguing simply to have a reason to keep talking.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

The Great Hall had been transformed so completely that it hardly resembled the room where you had spent seven years eating hurried breakfasts before class or quietly finishing essays beneath enchanted candles. Hundreds of floating lanterns drifted lazily beneath the bewitched ceiling, their warm light reflecting across polished marble and the gleaming floor that had been cleared for dancing. Music from the small orchestra gathered near the staff table floated effortlessly through the hall, wrapping itself around conversations and laughter until the entire evening seemed to move to the same gentle rhythm.

The Yule ball had finally arrived. You had spent months preparing this night.

You had organised rehearsal schedules, corrected footwork, adjusted postures, paired partners, and repeated the same instructions until your voice had become hoarse. Every carefully planned detail now unfolded exactly as you had imagined.

And yet the moment your eyes found Seungcheol standing near the entrance, every other part of the evening was irrelevant.

His formal robes were tailored neatly across his broad shoulders, replacing the perpetually rumpled uniform you had grown so accustomed to criticising. His usually unruly hair had been brushed back from his forehead, exposing his sharp features. Even the familiar confidence in the way he carried himself seemed more refined tonight.

You realised, with no small amount of annoyance, that you were staring at him.

As though sensing your attention, Seungcheol glanced toward the entrance and whatever he had been saying to Mingyu died halfway out of his mouth. His eyes moved over you, and he couldn’t help but settle his gaze on you. The hem of your dress pooled elegant and unfamiliar around you, your hair swept back from your face making you look prettier than you always looked.

He appeared almost caught off guard by his own inability to look elsewhere. His shoulders, which had been relaxed only moments earlier, straightened almost unconsciously.

You continued walking toward him, each measured step feeling strangely louder than the music surrounding you.

For the first time since meeting him, Seungcheol seemed to struggle for words.

When you finally stopped before him, he drew a quiet breath that sounded suspiciously like someone trying to steady themselves.

"You clean up well," he said, when you finally reached him, aiming for careless and missing it by a wide margin.

"So do you," you said, and heard how it came out, quieter than you meant it.

Neither of you managed anything cleverer than that. When the orchestra announced the beginning of the opening waltz, Seungcheol extended his hand toward you, and you took it.

You braced yourself for the same clumsy partner from rehearsals. Instead, when the music started and his hand found yours, his grip was sure and his posture was correct, every adjustment you had ever given him folded into instinct.

"You've been practicing," you said quietly, surprise softening your voice.

"Don't sound so shocked," he murmured back, though the corner of his mouth pulled up, pleased despite himself.

He led you through the opening steps without a single misplaced beat.

The difference should have been insignificant.

You had stood this close to him dozens of times already.

You had corrected this exact hand placement yourself.

You had physically moved his arm into position more than once.

But those memories belonged to borrowed bodies.

This...this was the first time it was truly him. And truly you.

His palm stayed warm against the small of your back, and your eyes kept finding his and holding there far longer than any formal dance required. Your cheeks went warm under his gaze. You looked away first, and when you glanced back he was still watching you, something soft caught at the corner of his mouth, and for once none of you reached for an argument.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

Several nights after the ball, you were back on ordinary prefect patrol, back in the same corridors where all of this had started, and to no one’s surprise, paired with Seungcheol.

It should have been an uneventful patrol. Instead, Seungcheol had spent the last ten minutes finding increasingly ridiculous ways to irritate you.

You ignored the first few comments.

Experience had taught you that acknowledging him only encouraged him.

Unfortunately, Seungcheol had also learned that lesson.

"I've been thinking," he said after another stretch of silence, sounding far too pleased with himself already. "I really wasted a remarkable opportunity during our body swap."

You continued walking. "I'm choosing not to ask."

"I probably should've walked into the Great Hall one morning," he continued anyway, "stood on the Gryffindor table, and announced—in your body, no less—that I'd been hopelessly in love with Choi Seungcheol since first year."

Your steps stopped so abruptly that the hem of your robes swished around your ankles.

Slowly and wordlessly, you turned to look at him.

He was grinning. "I think it would've been convincing."

You let out a slow breath through your nose, pressing two fingers briefly against your temple before beginning to walk again.

"I genuinely cannot decide," you muttered, "whether surviving the body swap made you a better person or an infinitely more irritating one."

"I was hoping for 'more charming.'"

"You truly are an arrogant git"

He laughed quietly to himself before falling into step beside you again, entirely unbothered by the insult.

"I mean," he continued after another few moments, "that would have explained why you keep staring at me so much.”

You spun toward him, your cheeks warm enough that you didn't need a mirror to know exactly what they looked like.

"Would you please stop talking?"

The words came out sharper than intended, though they lacked any real anger.

Seungcheol noticed immediately. His smile changed, and turned far more satisfied.

He took one unhurried step closer, close enough that you instinctively leaned back before realising there was nowhere to go. Your shoulders met the cool stone wall behind you, and before you had the chance to move again, he lifted one hand to brace himself lightly against the wall beside your head.

His eyes searched your face for a long moment before settling on the unmistakable warmth still colouring your cheeks.

"I see you’re not refusing it" he murmured, unable to hide the amusement tugging at the corner of his mouth.

Your heart gave one sharp, thoroughly inconvenient beat.

"...Shut up, Seungcheol."

This time, your voice came out much quieter than either of you expected.

"Make me" His eyes dropped to your mouth, lingered there a beat, and lifted back to your eyes

You leaned in before you could think better of it.

The decision was so sudden that for the smallest fraction of a second, Seungcheol simply stared at you. Whatever teasing remark had been sitting on the tip of his tongue disappeared entirely, replaced by an expression of genuine surprise.

He closed the distance anyway.

His hand found your jaw almost instinctively, fingers warm against your skin as though he needed to convince himself this was finally happening. Your own hand caught in the front of his robes without thinking, gathering the fabric as the distance between you disappeared entirely. The hand resting beside your head slid from the wall to your waist, drawing you closer until there was no space left between you. For a long moment there was nothing else, no rivalry, no seven years of pride, just the quiet drag of his mouth against yours and the wall solid at your back and his heartbeat thrumming close enough that you could feel it.

When you finally pulled back, both of you a little breathless, he rested his forehead against yours and let out a disbelieving laugh against your temple.

"Unbelievable things keep happening whenever we patrol together at night," he murmured.

"Maybe you should stop patrolling with me, then," you said, though you made no move to step back from his embrace.

"Not a chance," he said, and leaned in again, slower this time, and kissed you like he meant to keep doing it for a long while.

End.

📖 Before you leave Owl's Library, consider returning this record to the shelves with a reblog so other readers may find it.

The rain had been falling since the afternoon, turning the castle windows into rivers and made the corridors smell of wet stone. You had stayed later than usual in the greenhouses, repotting a stubborn batch of mandrakes for the second-years who would be arriving in a few weeks, and by the time you climbed back up to the staff quarters your boots were soaked through and your cardigan smelled like fertilizer.

You almost didn't hear it, a small sound, like a hiccup, half swallowed by the storm.

You stopped in the corridor outside the professors' wing, wand raised, and found a child tucked against the cold stone wall. He couldn't have been older than five or six, curled into himself with his knees drawn to his chest, dark unruly hair plastered to his forehead, his clothes damp at the shoulders and his cheeks pink from the cold. He was fast asleep despite all of it.

"Oh, dear."

You crouched beside him, carefully brushing the wet fringe away from his forehead. When he didn't stir, your first instinct was to get him warm.

Slipping your cardigan from your shoulders, you wrapped it around the tiny frame before gently lifting him into your arms. He was surprisingly light, his small pruned hands clutching at the fabric as he slept.

You hurried straight to Professor McGonagall's office.

She opened the door before you had even knocked twice. Her eyebrows lifted at the sight of the sleeping child bundled against you.

"I found him outside the professors' quarters," you explained. "He was freezing."

McGonagall's expression immediately hardened into business.

"Bring him inside."

A fire crackled in the grate as you settled the boy onto the sofa, rubbing gentle circles over his back in an attempt to warm him. McGonagall cast several warming charms over the room before turning to Filch, who had appeared in response to the commotion.

"Mr. Filch," she said briskly. "Gather available staff. Immediately."

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

It didn't take long. Within a few minutes, half the staff room had gathered, which was really only about nine people. McGonagall stood at the head of the room in her tartan dressing gown, looking like she would very much like to be back in bed. Flitwick hovered by the fireplace. Hagrid took up an entire corner simply by existing.

You looked down at the boy again, and something about him nagged at you. The straight dark hair, the soft feline shape of his eyes, even the slight downturn of his mouth in sleep, all of it reminding you vaguely of someone you passed in the corridors without really seeing. Before you could chase the thought further, he stirred. His nose scrunched, his fists rubbed sleepily at his eyes, and he blinked up at the unfamiliar room.

"Sweetheart, are you o—"

You never finished the question. He launched himself at you, small arms winding around your neck with startling strength, nearly knocking you backward as he buried his face against your shoulder. You went rigid with shock, hands hovering uselessly over his back, before instinct took over and you held him.

A broken sob escaped him. "Mama..." he hiccupped, the word breaking beneath another sob. "I looked everywhere for you."

Within seconds he was crying in earnest, hot snotty tears soaking into your cardigan, his fingers clutching at the fabric as though letting go would make you disappear. You looked up helplessly at McGonagall, at Flitwick, at anyone who might explain this. Nobody could, and the words you meant to say, that 'there had been some mistake', died in your throat against the completeness of his devastation. You gathered him closer instead, one hand cradling the back of his head, the other rubbing slow circles between his shoulder blades.

"Shh... it's alright," you murmured softly. "You're alright now."

When you pulled back to look at him, his cheeks were wet, his nose pink from crying and cold, and he couldn't have been older than five.

"What happened, sweetheart? Are you hurt?"

He only shook his head against your shoulder, one last shuddering sob escaping before his breathing evened into sniffles.

McGonagall stepped forward, her voice gentler than you had ever heard it. "Dear boy. What is your name?"

He loosened his grip enough to look at her, wiping his eyes on your cardigan sleeve. "I'm Woojin."

The room visibly relaxed. At least he was coherent.

"Woojin. That's a lovely name," you said.

"You named me, Mama," he said, like it was the most obvious thing in the world, then added, generously, in case you needed the rest, "Appa told me that."

"Do you know where your parents are, Woojin?" McGonagall asked. She was the only one composed enough to keep making sense of things.

Woojin looked around, found you first, and pointed. "Mama." Then his gaze slid past everyone else to the office door, just as another professor hurried in, wand still lit from the dark corridors, and his face lit up entirely.

Professor Jeon Wonwoo had barely crossed the threshold before the boy collided with his legs. "Appa!"

His eyes widened behind his glasses, genuine shock flashing across his usually unreadable face as he instinctively looked up at the people in the room, then back down at the child attached to him.

"Mama found me," Woojin said into his trousers, voice thick with tears, "but I was so scared," his hands tightening in the fabric as if to reassure himself Wonwoo was really there.

"I—" Wonwoo started, and had nothing to follow it with. His hand hovered a moment before settling gently on the boy's back. "I've got you."

McGonagall's eyes moved from the child, to Wonwoo, to you, and back again. The only sound left in the room was Woojin's sniffling. She removed her spectacles, pinched the bridge of her nose, and exhaled slowly.

"My office. Now. We have quite a bit to discuss."

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

"Home," Flitwick pressed gently, kneeling to Woojin's eye level, though they were nearly the same height already. "Can you tell us where home is, dear?"

The boy gave him a look that suggested this was a very silly question. "Hogwarts," he said. "Obviously."

"And your parents teach here? At Hogwarts?"

The little boy nodded as an answer.

McGonagall let the silence settle for a moment, studying the little boy who had long since abandoned any attempt at sitting properly. Woojin had curled into your side, one cheek resting against your shoulder while his small fingers remained stubbornly hooked around Wonwoo's sleeve, as though he needed to reassure himself that the two of you were still there. Whatever fear had reduced him to tears earlier seemed to have eased now that he was between the people he believed were his parents.

"Woojin," she said at last, her voice gentler than ever, "can you tell us a little about your parents?"

The effect was immediate. His face brightened so completely that it chased away the last traces of tears, and he twisted around to beam at Wonwoo with open admiration. "My appa's the best wizard ever," he said, stretching his arms wide. "Appa teaches defence and all the big kids like him." He giggled to himself before adding in a conspiratorial whisper, "Some people think he's scary, but they're just being silly. Appa's not scary."

A ripple of restrained amusement passed through the room, though Wonwoo looked as though he wished the stone floor might kindly open beneath him.

"Appa used to be a Auror" Woojin's hands flew up to illustrate every word. "He caught lots of bad people and fought bad monsters." He glanced proudly at Wonwoo again. "Mama says he's the bravest." He nodded, satisfied he remembered it right, and declared, "I'm gonna be bravest like him when I'm big."

You felt the weight of every professor's gaze drift toward Wonwoo, whose composure faltered just enough that his eyes lifted, almost involuntarily, to meet yours.

McGonagall let the silence pass before turning her attention back to the child. "And your mother?"

Woojin smiled just as brightly. Without hesitation, he leaned back against you until his head rested comfortably beneath your chin, as though he had occupied that spot a hundred times before. "Mama teaches Herbology," he said happily. "I go to the greenhouses with her sometimes and I help" He puffed out his chest with quiet pride. "I can water the plants all by myself now." Then he sighed dramatically. "But I'm still not allowed near the bitey ones. Mama says I'm too little."

Hagrid let out a booming laugh.

"Yer mum's got the right idea. Best keep away from the chompy ones till yeh're bigger."

A few quiet chuckles escaped around the office despite the increasingly impossible nature of the conversation.

Professor Flitwick smiled warmly, "Do you like living at Hogwarts, Woojin?"

"Mhm!" Woojin nodded enthusiastically, his feet swinging beneath the sofa. "I see Mama every day. And Appa." He began counting on his fingers. “Sometimes Appa takes me to the library, and..." His eyes suddenly found McGonagall again. "You always give me biscuits."

For the first time that evening, McGonagall looked genuinely surprised. "I do?"

He nodded so enthusiastically his fringe bounced. "The round buttery ones. You keep them in a tin," His voice dropped into another confidential whisper. "You say not to tell anyone, 'cause then everyone will want your biscuits."

The corners of McGonagall's mouth twitched despite herself. "I see."

Her gaze lingered on the three of you before she rose, smoothing her dressing gown. "I believe it would be prudent to contact the Ministry."

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

By the time the initial shock had settled, it was well past midnight. The Ministry had been contacted, preliminary statements had been taken, and despite an office full of brilliant witches and wizards, no one seemed any closer to understanding how a little boy claiming to be your son had appeared outside the professors' quarters.

Woojin, meanwhile, had reached the end of a very long day. His head kept drooping against your side before jerking upright again, only to repeat itself moments later.

McGonagall noticed it too. "I believe that is enough for one evening," she said, closing the folder before her with quiet finality. "The rest can wait until morning." Her gaze softened as it settled on Woojin.

"The poor boy needs sleep."

The question that remained was where, exactly, he was meant to sleep. He couldn't spend the night in an empty classroom, and neither of you thought he should be alone. Instinctively, both of you looked down the corridor beyond McGonagall's office.

Two doors.

Professor Jeon's quarters.

Professor Lee's quarters.

McGonagall rose from behind her desk and crossed the room, crouching carefully until she was level with the boy.

"Come along, dear," she said kindly. "Why don't you spend the night in my quarters? I've a spare room, and we'll have a proper breakfast in the morning, along with the biscuits you like."

Woojin only shuffled closer, wedging himself between you and Wonwoo, refusing to let go of your sleeve. "No," he said, quiet and almost frightened. "I wanna stay with Mama and Appa."

McGonagall didn't seem offended in the least. If anything, her expression only softened further. "I see," she said, and looked between the three of you. "Well. That does complicate matters somewhat."

For the first time that evening the reality of it settled over you differently. You barely knew Professor Jeon. Outside departmental meetings and the occasional polite exchange in the Great Hall, the two of you had scarcely spoken in the two years you had both worked at Hogwarts. He kept to himself, and you had long since accepted that as simply the way he was. And now the two of you were discussing sleeping arrangements for a child who believed he was your son.

"Professor Jeon," you started, awkward. "You've still got to deal with the Ministry tonight, don't you?"

"I'll need to make a few reports and statements," he agreed.

"I'll take him tonight," you said, glancing down at Woojin, who was fighting to keep his eyes open. "I've looked after children before. My younger brother practically lived in my room until he was eight."

“Are you certain?” Wonwoo studied you a moment, that thoughtful, unreadable look of his, carrying the peculiar feeling of being carefully weighed. "You have had a long evening as well”

"I'll manage."

His gaze dropped to Woojin, whose fingers had found their way around both your sleeve and his own. After a long moment he inclined his head. "Thank you." It sounded almost strange coming from him. "Professor Lee, if anything comes up..."

"I'll come and find you."

He nodded once. "I'll be awake."

The exchange lasted barely a minute, and yet, as you left McGonagall's office, you realized it was the longest conversation the two of you had ever had. Behind you, his door closed with a quiet click.

You didn't expect the night to be particularly difficult. You had practically helped raise Chris. Children, you thought, weren't entirely unfamiliar territory.

You did not, it turned out, know how this child worked, not yet

The cot took only a flick of your wand to assemble. It was small, comfortable, tucked beside your own bed.

"There we are," you said softly.

Woojin looked at it, then looked at you. Before you could persuade him otherwise, he padded straight past it, climbed into your bed, disappeared beneath your blankets and patted the mattress beside him with sleepy certainty.

"Mama."

With a quiet sigh, you extinguished the bedside lamp and slipped beneath the blankets yourself. You let him sleep beside you today. Tomorrow, surely, things would be less strange.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

He was asleep almost before you settled beside him.

One small hand remained stubbornly fisted in the fabric of your nightshirt, refusing to let go even in sleep. Sometime in the middle of the night he shifted closer, inch by sleepy inch, until his cheek rested against your shoulder as though he'd been searching for it all along.. Then came the tiny sniffle

His brows pinched together and a soft, heartbreaking sound escaped him. A quiet, muffled sob of a child caught in the middle of a bad dream, crying without ever fully waking.

Something inside your chest gave way and you brushed your fingers gently through his dark hair, careful not to wake him.

"Hey," you whispered into the darkness. "It's alright sweetheart, you don't have to be scared."

You drew the blankets a little higher around his shoulders.

"I've got you."

Gradually, the little frown disappeared. His breathing evened out once more, warm against your shoulder.

Sleep never came quite so easily for you.

Instead, you lay awake listening to the steady rhythm of his breathing, unable to stop thinking about the woman somewhere, who had tucked this little boy into bed every night before somehow losing him.

Whoever she was...

She had to be terrified.

You hoped someone was telling her he would be alright.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

Morning came too early. For one disoriented moment you couldn't remember why your shoulder ached, or why someone else's breathing filled the quiet of your room. Then you looked down and remembered everything at once.

Getting yourself ready was one thing. Getting Woojin ready was another entirely. You had barely managed your own cardigan before he darted away from the chair you'd been coaxing him toward for five minutes, hairbrush still useless in your hand.

"Come here, sweetheart. It'll only take a minute."

"No." He stopped just out of reach, arms folding with all the seriousness a five year old could summon. "It hurts."

"I'll be gentle."

"Appa does it better." He patted his own unruly hair. "He makes it look like his."

"I'm afraid I don't know how your Appa does it," you admitted, smiling despite yourself, which only earned an offended huff and a turned away face. With a sigh you reached instead for the toothbrush you transfigured the night before. He accepted it obediently enough, until he looked down and his expression crumbled into disbelief. "This isn't my dinosaur one. Uncle got it for me. I can't brush my teeth without it."

"You absolutely can."

By the time someone knocked, you had given up on your own appearance entirely and opened the door mid argument about whether teeth brushing was optional. Wonwoo stood in the doorway, and whatever he had meant to say caught somewhere behind his teeth. His gaze swept over you, barefoot, hair damp and half brushed, cardigan buttoned askew, as though he couldn't quite reconcile the polished colleague he knew with the woman standing in front of him, harried by an impossible five year old before eight in the morning.

"Sorry," he said after a beat. "McGonagall says the Ministry's arrived. I thought," his gaze slid past you to where Woojin was attempting to hide the toothbrush under a cushion, "..do you want some help?"

"Please," you said, with real feeling, and stepped back to let him in.

He turned out to be considerably better at negotiating with a five year old than you expected, crouching to listen with total seriousness as Woojin explained the importance of the dinosaur toothbrush. Whatever quiet bargain passed between them, worked. Within minutes Woojin had surrendered the hairbrush without complaint, sat patiently while Wonwoo worked through the tangles of his hair, and agreed the substitute toothbrush could be ‘just for today.’

"I've been trying to do that for twenty minutes," you said, watching them in mild disbelief.

"He was very reasonable," Wonwoo said.

Woojin, delighted to have both of you in one room, skipped over. "Mama slept in again," he informed Wonwoo happily, without a trace of malice. "She's always late. But I didn't wake her up. I was good." He recited it like a familiar house rule. "'Let Mama sleep. She needs it more than we do.' Appa you always say that."

"Very good," Wonwoo agreed, straight faced, and caught your eye over the boy's head. Heat crept up your neck.

"I don't always sleep in," you muttered, reaching for your bag. "At least, I don't think I do."

You thought you caught the corner of his mouth twitch and you cleared your throat before the little boy could say something even more embarrassing.

"...We should probably head down for the meeting."

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

The Ministry officials arrived right away, after reading Professor McGonagall’s letter.

They introduced themselves as members of the Department of Mysteries, though none of them elaborated on what that actually meant. Dressed in unassuming grey robes and carrying curious brass instruments that hummed softly in their hands, they transformed an unused classroom into a temporary examination room and spent the better part of the morning trying to determine exactly who—or what—Woojin was.

Woojin, for his part, found the entire experience fascinating.

Outside the classroom, you waited with your arms folded tightly across your chest, listening to the occasional burst of childish chatter through the half-open door. Professor Jeon stood beside you in companionable silence, close enough that your shoulders nearly brushed.

"They keep looking at him like he's a puzzle to solve," you murmured.

"They're trying to understand him," Wonwoo replied quietly. After a pause, he added, “If any of them are unkind to him, I intend to say something about it, regardless of rank."

You looked at him, surprised by the protectiveness in his voice.

One by one, the possibilities were eliminated.

Memory charms.

Polyjuice Potion.

Transfiguration.

Illusions.

Every test reached the same conclusion.

Finally, the lead official requested a private meeting with you, Professor Jeon, and Professor McGonagall.

"There is no indication," the witch began carefully, "that this child has been altered or fabricated through magic."

She placed two sheets of parchment on McGonagall's desk.

"We also performed a magical signature analysis, and the child's magical signature naturally carries traces of both parents."

She looked between you and Wonwoo. "Woojin's magical signature matches both of yours."

"...No," you said quietly, staring at the parchment for another long moment before shaking your head.

"There has to be some mistake." Your eyes flicked helplessly between Professor McGonagall and the woman seated across the desk. "We've never..."

The words lodged stubbornly in your throat.

Beside you, Wonwoo spoke before you could force yourself to finish.

"...We're just acquaintances."

You looked at him gratefully, and nodded.

"We work together," he said, almost absently, as though saying it aloud would somehow make the conclusion change. "We've never been anything beyond colleagues."

Silence settled over the office.

The official folded her hands neatly atop the desk.

"There is no known spell capable of forging that result," the lead official said carefully, in the privacy of McGonagall's office "As far as the Ministry can determine... this child is biologically yours."

You found yourself reading the report again, despite already knowing exactly what it said, as though the letters might have changed in the last few seconds.

Beside you, Wonwoo removed his glasses, pinching the bridge of his nose before putting them back on again.

"Time," McGonagall said eventually, "is the only variable I can think of that would explain a child appearing who is, biologically, already yours, when neither of you has so much as had dinner together."

You, sitting very straight in your chair with hands folded tightly in your lap, felt something in her chest go strange and light and frightened all at once. Beside your, Wonwoo hadn't moved, but anyone could see, in the careful, controlled stillness of him, that he was thinking exactly as fast and exactly as far ahead as you were.

"We'll investigate the how," McGonagall said, not unkindly. "In the meantime, the boy has made his preferences extremely clear, and I see little value in fighting a five-year-old’s instincts when they've so far been correct about everything else. Professors Jeon and Lee, until we know otherwise, I'm placing him in your joint care."

The meeting dissolved not long after.

Outside, Woojin was exactly where you left him, on the stone bench with Hagrid, legs swinging as the gamekeeper showed him something cupped in his enormous hands. The moment he spotted you both, a wide smile appeared on his face. "Mama! Appa!" He slid down and trotted over, slipping one hand into each of yours as though it were the most natural thing in the world.

Hagrid chuckled as he rose to his feet.

"Kept 'im company while yeh lot were busy," he said. "Good little lad, this one."

"Thank you, Hagrid," Wonwoo said sincerely.

Hagrid waved it off with a smile before lumbering away, leaving the three of you standing together in the quiet corridor.

“Finished?”, Woojin asked curiously, looking up at both of you. "I'm hungry."

You exchanged a brief, helpless glance over the top of his head with Wonwoo. Neither of you had the heart to tell him that nothing was finished at all.

"Come on," you said eventually, squeezing his little hand. "Let's get some breakfast."

After everything the Ministry had just told you, trying to make sense of the impossible on empty stomachs seemed like a particularly poor idea.

Woojin started happily swinging your joined hands as the three of you started down the corridor. You'd barely made it a few steps before he stopped so abruptly that you almost walked straight into him.

"...Mama?"

You looked down. "Hm?"

He shifted awkwardly from one foot to the other, glancing briefly at Wonwoo before leaning closer to you"...I need the toilet."

There was a beat of silence.

Then, despite everything that had happened that morning, you let out a chuckle.

You caught yourself just in time, smoothing your expression before he could mistake it for teasing.

"Right," you said with all the seriousness you could manage. "That does seem rather urgent."

Beside you, Wonwoo cleared his throat, though you caught the faintest hint of amusement softening his otherwise impassive expression. It was such an ordinary problem, contrasting everything the two of you had been dealing with since the night before.

"I'll meet you in the Great Hall," he said.

"We'll be there shortly." You smiled gently at him.

The moment you took a step, Woojin immediately began tugging you along with considerably more urgency than before.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

The Great Hall was mostly empty this early in the term, the students not due back for another week. It was, you thought, the only mercy available to you that morning.

A handful of professors had already gathered at the staff table, breakfast spread lazily before them.

At one end, Quidditch coach, Kim Mingyu was halfway through his toast, chatting idly with Wonwoo. "So," he said around a mouthful, "I heard something interesting happened last night. They say you've got a kid now." He grinned. "Shame I missed it. Would've loved to witness the birth."

"Shut up and eat your breakfast," Wonwoo said flatly, not looking up from his coffee.

At that moment you stepped in with Woojin marching several paces ahead, waving at each professor as though he'd done it every morning of his life. Then his eyes landed on Mingyu and lit up entirely. "Uncle Gyu!" He barreled straight into him.

Mingyu froze with his toast halfway to his mouth. "Uncle?" He looked from the boy clinging to his side, to you, to Wonwoo. "Jeon. Care to explain why your alleged son thinks I'm his uncle?" But Woojin was already climbing onto him, fists in his robes, and whatever surprise Mingyu felt lasted about two seconds before dissolving into delight.

"You promised you'd take me flying," Woojin reminded him, very seriously. "Yesterday. You said."

"I did?" Mingyu blinked.

"Yesterday," Woojin reminded him very seriously. "You said."

Mingyu looked helplessly towards Wonwoo. "...Did I?" , his attention back to Woojin, who was waiting with unwavering confidence.

"Well... Clearly I'm a man of my word " He grinned. "how about after breakfast?"

Woojin gasped happily before scrambling down again. He hurried straight over to Wonwoo, climbing onto his lap without invitation and cupping his face between both tiny hands.

"Appa," he asked earnestly, "can I go?"

Then he twisted around to look at you.

"Mama?"

For a split second, you froze. Your instinct was to say yes. Then another thought occurred to you.

You had absolutely no idea whether you and Wonwoo had rules about things like this.

"Eat first," you said instead.

Woojin's smile faltered.

"But—"

"You've hardly eaten," you said gently. "Finish your breakfast, and then you can go."

You looked across him, at Wonwoo. "Do you think that's alright, Professor Jeon?" The title felt strange after "Appa" only moments earlier.

Woojin's shoulders slumped, appealing wordlessly to the other parent, but Wonwoo only said, "Mama's right," and the boy sighed and hopped down, taking an exaggerated bite of his sandwich.

Mingyu laughed. "He's definitely your son."

You chose not to ask which one of you he meant.

The moment he was done eating, Woojin was on his feet before anyone else had even pushed back their chair.

"I'm done!"

Before either of you could say another word, Mingyu had already scooped him effortlessly onto one shoulder.

"Come on then, Mini-Jeon."

Their laughter echoed across the Great Hall as the pair disappeared towards the doors together.

Which left the two of you alone at the staff table, breakfast half eaten, with a conversation neither of you had quite prepared for.

"We should talk about how this is going to work," you said.

"Yes," Wonwoo agreed.

You looked at each other, two colleagues who three days ago had rarely exchanged more than polite greetings. "Whatever happens, however he got here, however the Ministry sends him back, he's still five," you said. "He doesn't understand any of this. He's frightened. The least we can do is make sure he feels safe until it's over."

"I agree," Wonwoo said, without hesitation, resting his forearms on the table, already thinking ahead. "The students return next week. Until then, one of us can always be with him."

You nodded. "If I have no lessons, he can stay with me in the greenhouses."

"And during my free periods..." His gaze drifted towards the doors Woojin had disappeared through. "...I'll take him."

You let out a breath, some of the panic that had lived in your chest since the boy first wrapped his arms around your neck finally easing. "So we'll just figure it out."

"We will."

For now, at least, neither of you had to figure it out alone.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

The week that followed should have been simple. But, it wasn't.

You settled into the arrangement, Woojin's mornings in the greenhouses, coloring at a little workbench while you repotted seedlings, his afternoons in the Defence classroom with Wonwoo, parchment and crayons spread while lesson plans got written around him. The handovers were brief and polite. Professor Lee. Professor Jeon. A quick word about whether he'd eaten or napped, and then one of you would return to work while the other walked away with his small hand in theirs.

It was practical and organized. Exactly what two colleagues might come up with facing an impossible situation.

It should have worked. Instead, almost without either of you noticing, Woojin began to change.

The chatter went first, the little stories that used to tumble out of him without pause, about Fang, about Uncle Gyu and flying, about Flitwick's levitating feathers, grew fewer and fewer until most meals passed in near silence. Then the smaller things. He stopped reminding you that you supposedly gave him a flower from the greenhouse every day. He stopped correcting Wonwoo when he forgot some detail his Appa should have known. By the end of the week he barely touched his food. There was no tantrum, nothing dramatic to point to, just a boy shrinking a little further into himself each day, his smiles rarer, his laughter quieter, the brightness that had burst into your life outside the professors' quarters slowly dimming.

You noticed it and so did Wonwoo. However, neither of you could figure out why.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

The greenhouses had long since emptied one evening, the last gold light fading from the grounds, when you noticed the silence first. Usually Woojin waited on the bench outside, legs swinging, ready to show off whatever he had drawn. Tonight, he wasn't there. A tiny sniffle carried through the quiet instead. You found him curled against the doorframe, knees to his chest, small shaky sobs escaping into his sleeves.

"Woojin?"

His head lifted just as hurried footsteps rounded the corner, Wonwoo, who had come to collect him for dinner, stopping short at the sight. The two of you exchanged one panicked look before crouching together. Your hand found his shoulder. "Hey, sweetheart. What's wrong?"

That was all it took. He threw himself into your arms, shaking, and you wrapped him up while Wonwoo lowered onto one knee, palm circling slow between his shoulder blades. "What's wrong, buddy? Tell us."

It took a long moment before he could speak. "How long," he hiccupped, "are you gonna stay mad at each other?"

You blinked in surprise. "What?"

"Mama and Appa..." Another sob broke through before he could finish. "...You're mad."

"We’re not angry," you said immediately, looking helplessly towards Wonwoo before turning back to the little boy. "Sweetheart, I promise I'm not—"

"Mama liar." The words landed like a slap. He'd never called you that before.

He shook his head, tears spilling fresh. "You call Appa 'Professor.' Mama never calls Appa 'Professor.' You don't eat breakfast together. And Appa doesn't come get you after the greenhouses. You don't read me stories together. You don't say goodnight together." His voice kept dropping. "You don't even sleep in the same house."

His breath hitched high and miserable. "Did I do something? I'm sorry..."

Your heart broke clean in half. Beside you Wonwoo had gone rigid. "You didn't do anything," he said, low and fierce. "Nothing about this is your fault. You didn't make us angry."

"We're not angry with each other," you said, brushing the damp hair from his face. "Do you want to go home? Hm?"

The words hung heavily in the evening air.

Woojin's shoulders trembled as he looked desperately from one face to the other. He sniffled, slipped one small hand into yours, then reached for Wonwoo's with the other and he began walking.

You and Wonwoo exchanged one confused glance before following, letting the little boy lead you through the quiet corridors of the castle, never once hesitating, until he stopped outside a familiar door. Professor Jeon's quarters.

Only then did he look up at the two of you, still holding both your hands.

"...Home."

You went in. There didn't seem to be any other option.

Wonwoo's quarters were, nearly identical in size and shape to yours, and almost entirely bare of anything personal. There was a neat stack of books, a single armchair, a room that looked like it belonged to a man who spent as little time as possible actually living in it. Woojin stood in the middle of it, small and confused, turning in a slow circle.

"Where's my room?" he asked. "Where's my toys?"

There was nothing to show him, no room, no toys, no trace of the boy he was, only two adults trying to comfort a child for the absence of a life that hadn't been built yet.

You knelt and wiped his face with your sleeve. "Sleep for tonight. Tomorrow, I promise, we'll get you new toys. A whole room full, if you want."

He considered this gravely and nodded. "Promise?"

"Promise," Wonwoo said, and meant it in the particular, unshakeable way you were coming to learn was simply how he meant everything.

Satisfied, Woojin rubbed his eyes, yawned, and padded toward the bedroom as if he knew every step by heart, climbing beneath the blankets before either of you reached the doorway. He scooted to the center and patted the empty space on either side. "Can I sleep in the middle tonight?"

The room fell silent. You looked at Wonwoo. He looked at you.

"...The middle?" you echoed weakly.

Woojin nodded, it was the most ordinary request in the world for him.

You hesitated until Woojin had disappeared almost entirely beneath the blankets, only his sleepy little face peeking out.

Leaning towards Wonwoo, you lowered your voice to little more than a whisper.

"...What do we do?"

"He's already distressed," he murmured finally. "If we tell him no now..." He didn't need to finish it. "Stay here until he falls asleep."

You nodded. "Just until he falls asleep."

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

Morning came slowly. You woke first, it taking a long moment to place the unfamiliar mattress, before you felt something warm and heavy draped across your waist. Woojin had migrated in the night until he was sprawled almost entirely over you, one leg thrown across your middle. You smiled, then glanced past him and froze. You didn’t realise that you had accidentally fallen asleep last night beside the two boys.

Wonwoo was asleep on the other side of the bed. Without his glasses, without the polished look he carried through every staff meeting, he looked... younger somehow. One arm was thrown over his head, the other resting loosely near Woojin.

And beside him, Woojin slept exactly the same way, the same arm flung above the head, the same slight parting of the lips, even the same faint crease settled between their brows. It was almost unsettling, how alike they looked.

A strand of dark hair had fallen across Wonwoo's forehead, obscuring part of his face. Before you could think better of it, your hand lifted almost on instinct, fingers moving carefully toward the loose strand.

The moment your fingertips grazed his hair, brown eyes blinked open.

You stilled, like a deer caught in headlights. ”Oh”

“I was just..observing” Then, quietly, you murmured, "...He sleeps like you."

His eyes flicked to Woojin's arm still flung over, then back. "Does he?" His voice was rough with sleep, deeper than you had ever heard it.

"The same expression and the same way he throws his arm over his head."

He looked at the boy a long moment. "I never would've noticed," he said, in his raspy voice. Neither of you spoke after that. Between you, Woojin sighed contentedly in his sleep and burrowed closer, anchoring himself to both of you at once.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

You went to Hogsmaede the very next morning, all three of you, to fulfil previous night’s promise of getting toys and clothes for Woojin.

The first stop was a children's clothing shop, and within minutes you'd disappeared into the racks. "Woojin, come here." You held a tiny knitted jumper against his front. "Oh, look at you. You're adorable."

"I look handsome," he corrected.

"You look very handsome."

Before you could admire him any longer, the jumper disappeared from your hands. Wonwoo had taken it without a word, turning it over to inspect the label before feeling the fabric between his fingers. Satisfied, he placed it into the trolley while you wandered off again.

"Oh! Woojin, come look at these."

The pattern repeated itself half a dozen times, socks embroidered with broomsticks, robes so impossibly small they made you coo, a knitted hat with bear ears, you and Woojin gasping over each discovery as though it outdid the last, while Wonwoo quietly sorted excitement from practicality behind you, checking sizes and seams before either dropping an item in the trolley or returning it to the shelf.

At one point you and Woojin reached for the same pants at the same moment, looked at each other, and said "in the trolley" in perfect unison. Woojin dissolved into giggles. So did you. Wonwoo paused with another mini sweater halfway to the trolley, watching the two of you laugh over something so inconsequential, and thought, though he didn't say it, that even if Woojin didn’t look like you, he had definitely inherited your joyful personality.

Without a word, he set the pants into the trolley and followed after the pair of you once more.

By the time you finished buying clothes, toys, bedding, books, and enough school supplies, the afternoon had slipped quietly into evening.

Dinner was at a little restaurant tucked between a bookshop and an apothecary, warm with the smell of fresh bread. Until your meals arrived, Woojin had already begun drooping where he sat beside Wonwoo.

He lasted about halfway through his dinner before his cheek settled onto the tabletop with a tiny sigh, the glass of pumpkin juice still clutched loosely in one hand.

You smiled fondly. "I think someone's reached his limit."

Wonwoo glanced over and without disturbing him, he quietly slid the abandoned food onto a plate before pulling the glass of pumpkin juice safely out of the boy's reach.

Only then did he look back at you.

"So," he said, the first time he'd ever started a conversation without prompting. "Did you always want to teach?"

You blinked, pleasantly surprised.

"I think so," You traced absent-minded circles around the rim of your mug. "Professor Sprout was my favourite when I was here. She made everyone feel like they belonged in her classroom. I wasn't particularly talented at first. I nearly killed a Venomous Tentacula in second year."

"...Impressive."

"It wasn't on purpose." You laughed. "I just remember thinking, if I could make one student love Herbology the way she made me love it, I'd have done something worthwhile."

"I imagine you already have." He said it so plainly it took you a second to realize he meant it. "And you?" you asked. "Woojin mentioned you being an Auror."

"I joined the Ministry after graduation." He leaned back slightly.

"It felt like the right thing to do. I was good at it." There was no arrogance in his words, just facts.

"But..." His gaze drifted briefly to the little boy asleep beside him, “eventually I realized I couldn't protect everyone. Perhaps I could teach someone else how to protect themselves instead. So I came here."

You looked at Woojin, asleep between you, utterly convinced this thoughtful, reserved man was his father. "I get it why he looks at you the way he does. Like you can fix anything."

"...I hope," he said quietly, "...I never give him a reason to think otherwise."

By the time you started back toward the castle, Woojin had gone entirely boneless with exhaustion, walking between you with a hand in each of yours, until somewhere along the path his feet simply stopped moving altogether and Wonwoo swept him up without breaking stride, settling him against his shoulder and he was asleep before you'd cleared the gates.

"I'll take him tonight," Wonwoo said quietly, adjusting his hold on the boy. "You should rest. You both used up too much energy while shopping.”

You didn't argue. You walked back to the castle beside him in comfortable, unhurried silence, watching and admiring the way Wonwoo had stepped up into his role so effortlessly.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

Students returned the following week, and it took less than a day for the entire castle to discover that Professor Jeon had, apparently, acquired a child.

Woojin looked so unmistakably like Wonwoo, same eyes, same careful, watchful stillness, the same particular way of tilting his head when he was thinking. The resemblance alone silenced most speculation. It took a little longer for anyone to connect the boy to you, mostly because you and Wonwoo had been so studiously careful in public, but it happened anyway, and by the second afternoon the whole school seemed to know that the small boy trailing Professor Jeon between classes called Professor Lee "Mama."

Your brother heard it from three people before lunch and arrived at your Herbology classroom at a dead run.

He burst through the door mid-lesson, loud and dramatic as ever, and you rounded on him without missing a beat. "I am teaching, Chan, go back to your dormitory or I will hex you where you stand."

But Woojin had already spotted him from his corner table, where he'd been colouring quietly through the lesson exactly as he always did. "Uncle Dino!"

Chan blinked. "Huh—?" But the boy had already crossed the room and grabbed his sleeve, tugging him down into the corner with the urgent, conspiratorial whisper of a child sharing a secret.

"Why are you at Hogwarts?" Woojin whispered. "You're supposed to be at work."

"What work?" Chan asked, faintly dazed, crouching properly now, studying the boy's face with growing, dawning confusion. The resemblance to Wonwoo really was uncanny. "How old are you kid?"

Woojin held up five fingers. "Five. I'm a big boy."

The class had, by now, entirely abandoned any pretence of working. You dismissed them five minutes early out of pure self-preservation, and the moment the door shut behind the last student, Chan rounded on you with the full, righteous fury of a man who has just done extremely questionable maths.

"Five years?" he demanded. "You hid a child from me for five years? I'm telling Mum and Dad."

You smacked the back of his head without much force and dragged him toward the door, explaining low and fast everything that had happened. His expression cycled through disbelief, alarm, and fascination. "So he just appeared? In a corridor? And nobody's told Mum and Dad?"

"McGonagall wanted to keep it contained until the Ministry understood what they were dealing with," You said, moving down the row of Mandrake pots with the automatic efficiency. "There's nothing to tell them yet. There's nothing certain to tell anyone yet."

"There's a child, noona. That feels fairly certain." He lowered his voice, glancing at Woojin, who was very obviously listening despite pretending otherwise. "Does he — does Professor Jeon know? Properly know? Has he said anything? Because if he's making you handle this on your own while he just stands there being broody and unreadable like he always—"

"He's been extremely present, actually," you said, sharper than you meant to, faintly surprised by your own defensiveness. "He is good with both of us."

"So you and Professor Jeon..." He said the name like it tasted strange. "He barely talks. Is he good to you? Because I don't care if it's the future or the past or whatever timeline nonsense this is, if he ever—"

"Chan."

"I'm just SAYING—"

"Uncle Dino and Appa are best friends," Woojin announced, from where he'd resettled himself contentedly on the crate beside him, "Appa says you're the little brother he never had."

You couldn't help smiling. Somehow, it was comforting to know that somewhere in some timeline, your brother had found a best friend in Wonwoo. You hadn't expected that of all things, but it felt right.

"That's not—" Chan opened his mouth, closed it, opened it again. "That doesn't sound like Jeon Wonwoo at all—"

"Was I not supposed to say that?" Woojin asked, blinking up at him, entirely innocent, already sensing from the sudden stillness in the room that he had said something he wasn't meant to.

You closed your eyes briefly and reached for patience.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

Woojin settled, in the weeks that followed, into the rhythm of the castle so completely it became hard to remember what Hogwarts had looked like without him.

One evening the greenhouses had gone quiet, students long gone, the castle settling into its nighttime hush beyond the glass, when the door creaked and Wonwoo stepped inside.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I didn't mean to interrupt."

"You aren't." You glanced up from the moonlily buds you were coaxing open.

"I came to see if you were still here," he said. "Woojin was asking where you were."

Your expression softened. "Is he alright?"

Wonwoo sat on a stool, pulling it closer to your set. "He waited up." said, the corner of his mouth lifting,"..but ended up falling asleep."

You smiled to yourself. "I'll apologise in the morning for making him wait up."

"He won't remember."

His gaze drifted to the flowers. "What are these?"

"Moonlilies. They only bloom after sunset, rather boring during the day." Your fingers brushed a pale blossom as another unfurled beside it, silver petals catching the moonlight through the glass roof.

"They're beautiful," he said.

"They're my favourite." You gestured at the rows stretching deeper into the greenhouse. "They'll keep blooming another hour or so. If you ever can't sleep, you can come see them."

Something unreadable crossed his face. "I'd like that."

The quiet settled again, comfortable, until he spoke. "Hold still." You blinked, and he leaned closer, reaching up to brush his thumb across your cheek. "There. You had mud." Your heartbeat became unexpectedly hard to ignore. He seemed entirely unaffected, or simply very good at pretending otherwise.

After a moment, as though the question had only just occurred to him, “Do you have a partner?"

The question caught you so off guard you laughed. "No."

"No one waiting for you?"

"No."

He nodded once. "I've been thinking," he said. "About Woojin. He still wakes some nights expecting both of us, and we keep sending him between two rooms." He paused. "I was wondering whether we should ask Professor McGonagall if our quarters could be connected. So he has one home."

The thought lingered longer than you expected. It wasn't technically moving in together, just one home, for a little boy who couldn't understand why his parents lived apart. "I think he'd like that," you said.

"I do too."

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

McGonagall agreed the next morning with the look of a woman who'd been waiting rather a while to be asked, and the magic took most of an afternoon, walls softening, a doorway blooming where there had been solid stone, two sets of rooms folding into one home neither of you had entirely built on purpose.

You brought Woojin to see it after dinner. He walked in ahead of you, and the moment he crossed the threshold he simply lit up, spinning in a delighted circle.

You brought Woojin to see it after dinner. He walked in ahead of you and lit up completely, spinning in a circle. "My house is back!" He threw his arms around the couch. "I missed you, home!" then, abruptly, "Where's Seol?" already forgotten in the next breath as he sprinted for the bedroom that had once been yours.

"Mama, Mama, this is my room!" he announced, bouncing on the bed with total confidence, and you didn't have the heart to correct him, didn't particularly want to.

He herded you both through the rest of it with the brisk, self-appointed authority of a very small landlord, and finished by planting himself in front of what had been Wonwoo's door alone,until that afternoon, pointing inside. "Go to your room. Goodnight, Mama." He rose on his toes, pulling you lower and pressed a firm kiss to your cheek, then did the same to Wonwoo, who accepted it with startled, helpless tenderness. Then Woojin stepped back, arms crossed, and looked between the two of you expectantly.

"Now your turn," he said, like this was simply the next obvious step in the routine.

You and Wonwoo looked at each other. A warm flush crept across your cheeks, his ears turning red in similar fashion.

"...Oh," you managed intelligently.

Beside you, Wonwoo looked equally flustered, clearing his throat as though searching for words.

Before either of you could decide who was supposed to move first—

"Fast," Woojin giggled, looking at the pair of you like you were being terribly silly. He pointed at his own cheeks with both hands. "Goodnight kisses!"

You closed your eyes for the briefest moment. Wonwoo quietly looked at the ceiling.

"...Right," you mumbled.

Woojin waited patiently while the two of you recovered enough dignity to lean down and kiss one of his cheeks each

Woojin dissolved into delighted laughter. "Silly Mama and Dada," he announced, thoroughly unbothered by the fact that you'd both gone crimson and speechless, and skipped off to his own room without a backward glance, leaving the two of you standing in the doorway in the sudden, charged quiet he had left behind.

Neither of you said very much, after that. There wasn't, really, anything sensible to say.

You ended up in the same room. It seemed the simplest arrangement now that the quarters had become one home instead of two, and neither of you had the energy to overthink what that might mean.

He was careful with you. Quiet, steady, bringing the same attentiveness he brought to everything, and you found you trusted it completely, the way you had found yourself trusting nearly everything about him these past weeks without quite noticing when it started. His hand found yours in the dark. Sleep came slowly, not from discomfort, but from being suddenly, acutely aware of each other in a way you hadn't been before. Eventually, exhaustion won and you both drifted to a quiet sleep.

Woojin woke sometime after midnight.

He padded sleepily into the hallway, rubbing one eye with the back of his fist. The door to the bedroom stood slightly ajar.

He peeked in. Moonlight spilled across the room, and his parents were asleep, your back against Wonwoo’s chest, his arm loose around your waist, both of you breathing with the heavy rhythm of people too tired to notice how close you had ended up. His sleepy face broke into the biggest grin. "You’re back," he whispered, and climbed carefully onto the bed, curling up in front of you instead of between you, pulling your arm over himself with practiced familiarity, asleep again within seconds.

Wonwoo woke first in the morning. Woojin lay between you now, not separating you, but tucked safely in front of you, your arm around him, his own arm still loose around your waist. Three people. One tangled shape on the bed.

He watched you both breathe a moment, then reached up and gently tucked a loose strand of hair behind your ear before settling back against the pillow. For once, he felt no urgency to get up. Morning could wait.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

With Woojin increasingly absorbed into afternoons with Uncle Dino or Uncle Gyu, you and Wonwoo found yourselves with actual unclaimed hours, and neither of you was quite willing to waste them.

It was Wonwoo who moved first.

He started appearing at the greenhouse door with two steaming cups of tea, lingering awkwardly in the doorway until you looked up from your work.

"Thought you might want company," he'd say, as though that alone explained why he crossed half the castle during his free period.

More often than not, Woojin would toddle over the moment he spotted him, abandoning whatever stick or flower had captured his attention. Wonwoo would wordlessly scoop him with one before handing you your tea. Within a week the gesture had become second nature.

A few days later you found him asleep over a stack of essays, quill still loose in his hand. You slipped his glasses off his face and set them beside the parchment before nudging his shoulder.

He blinked awake, disoriented, and you told him plainly that he needed to go to bed.

"I still have—"

"You've been raising an energetic five year old all day," you said, folding your arms. "The essays can wait."

He looked at you for a long moment, and something in his expression softened before he admitted, voice still thick with sleep "I don't mind either of your energies," he stifled a yawn, stretching his arms "..makes me happy."

You had absolutely no idea what to do with that so you said nothing at all.

He still insisted on staying up most nights to finish grading, so eventually you started bringing your own work into his office instead of arguing about it. Neither of you said much once you were both settled. He would shift his chair a little closer, you would spread your parchment across the corner of his desk, and the two of you worked in companionable silence until the candles burned low.

He began walking you to your classroom afterward too, even though the route took him the opposite way from his own. He never explained it beyond insisting he would get to his class eventually, and eventually, it seemed, always meant after he'd seen you safely to your door.

On the colder mornings you were the one who stopped him and Woojin halfway across the courtyard, pointing sternly at the hat dangling forgotten from Woojin's hand until he groaned and put it on. Then you turned the same look on Wonwoo.

"You too."

He blinked in suprise."...Me?"

"You'll both catch cold," you said, and without another word pulled his scarf a little tighter around him.

He noticed things before you did. A quill running low on ink would be quietly replaced on your desk overnight. If you skipped lunch, a neatly wrapped sandwich would turn up in the staff room by early afternoon, and you'd know without asking where it came from.

You noticed things too. Whenever he buried himself in paperwork through mealtimes, you started simply setting a plate down beside him in the Great Hall and waiting until he ate it, ignoring whatever protest he tried to offer. Woojin, already halfway through his own shepherd's pie, took to backing you up without being asked, informing his father solemnly that Mama had said to eat, so he should eat.

Wonwoo accepted defeat every time.

Across the table, Mingyu had taken to watching these exchanges with an unbearably smug grin, and one evening he finally said aloud what he'd clearly been thinking for weeks, “I love your little family

You and Wonwoo looked up in perfect unison.

"We're not—"

"...a family?" Mingyu finished for you, smiling into his drink. "Right."

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

Slowly, the conversations that had once ended after a polite greeting stretched into long ones. Silence stopped feeling awkward between you. You learned that Wonwoo didn't speak often, not because he had nothing to say, but because he waited until something was worth saying. He learned, in turn, that you talked enough for the both of you, wandering easily from Herbology to your brother's latest letter to a book you read years ago that had suddenly reminded you of a student.

Most people interrupted you eventually. Wonwoo never did. He listened with his attention fixed solely on you. Over time you began to notice the small things about him that anyone else might have missed: the faint lift at the corner of his mouth, the thoughtful hum whenever he disagreed, the way he would bring up something you had mentioned days earlier as though it had never once left his mind.

Somehow, without either of you deciding it, spending time together stopped feeling like an obligation born from impossible circumstances. You began to look forward to it instead.

One evening, while Woojin sat between you at the table stubbornly sounding out a picture book, you found yourself watching Wonwoo rather than the page. He guided the boy through each difficult word with endless patience, never frustrated, never rushing him, and the thought left you before you could stop it.

"I think I understand now," you said, "why I'd marry you."

You looked at him, a little embarrassed after the words left you, and Wonwoo looked completely caught off guard.

"I think I do too." He held your gaze for a long, quiet moment.

Then, almost shyly, he looked back down at the book beside him, where Woojin was still waiting, for his appa to help him with the next word.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

The best afternoons belonged entirely to Woojin.

They usually started with a game of tag across the grounds, Wonwoo pretending badly not to be fast enough to catch him, until somehow you were running too, laughing while Woojin shrieked with delight between the two of you.

Someone always tripped eventually, usually you, and Wonwoo would stumble trying to catch you before all three of you went down together in the grass, Woojin throwing himself on top of the pile with a triumphant declaration that your pile was now a hamburger.

You and Wonwoo dissolved into helpless laughter beneath the weight of a giggling five year old.

It was in moments like these that you had to remind yourself, gently and every time, that none of it was permanent.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

The Ministry officials returned in early October with answers at last.

An illegal Time-Turner experiment had torn open a fracture between two points in time. Woojin had wandered too close, slipping through before anyone could stop him. He had never belonged in this timeline—not because he came from another world, but because he came from several years ahead.

Somewhere in that future, two frantic parents had spent weeks searching for the little boy who had vanished without a trace.

"There is a window," the lead investigator explained quietly. "We can safely return him."

The witch hesitated before continuing.

"The timeline will... protect itself afterwards."

You asked her what that meant.

"Everyone’s memories won't disappear all at once," she said. "But as the fracture closes, they'll begin to blur. Faces first, then conversations. Eventually it will feel more like something you dreamed than something you lived." Woojin would forget these months too. He would remember growing up exactly as he was meant to. As far as he would ever know, he had never been here at all.

It was supposed to be a kindness, yet it felt unimaginably cruel.

The walk back to the castle was silent.

That night, neither of you slept much. Woojin, blissfully unconcerned, lay between you talking about things that happened that morning-- Uncle Gyu teaching him Quidditch fouls, Uncle Dino taking him along with his friends to Hogsmeade. Every ordinary little story landed somewhere deep inside you, each one another reminder that there was an entire life waiting for him beyond your reach.

Eventually his words grew slower, each sentence interrupted by a yawn, until they dissolved into sleepy murmurs. Within minutes he was asleep between you, one small hand fisted loosely in the fabric of Wonwoo's sleeve.

You watched him for a long time. Then, unable to stop yourself, you gathered him carefully into your arms and pressed your face into his soft hair. The first tear fell before you realized you were crying, and you tried to stay quiet so you wouldn't wake him.

Beside you, Wonwoo didn't say a word. He simply moved closer until your shoulders touched, then wrapped one arm around both of you, drawing you and the sleeping boy against his chest. You felt his chin come to rest lightly atop your head. For a while there was only warmth, and the quiet understanding that for one more night, the three of you were still here. You leaned into him, having a final night with the family you had briefly been allowed to borrow.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

The Astronomy Tower was quiet at dawn.

Woojin stood between you, one hand tucked into yours and the other in Wonwoo's, looking more curious than frightened.

"Will you be okay?" you asked softly.

He looked up at you with complete certainty. "I'll see you for dinner."

The words caught somewhere behind your ribs. Wonwoo crouched down in front of him and smoothed a wrinkle from his little jumper, telling him gently that his mum and dad had been looking for him. Woojin frowned, as though the sentence didn't make any sense at all

"You are my mum and dad."

You dropped to your knees beside Wonwoo, your shoulder brushing his.

"We are," you whispered, your voice trembling. "Just... a little earlier."

Still not able to grasp the meaning, he wrapped both tiny arms around the two of you together, deciding it probably wasn’t that important anyway.

"I'll see Mama and Appa for dinner,” he mumbled into the hug.

The Ministry kept its promise. The memories faded carefully over the following days, lifted away one by one until neither of you could remember the name of the child you loved, only the shape he had left behind.

Some things, however, refused to disappear. Whatever the timeline had taken, it hadn't touched what you and Wonwoo now shared. Somehow, without either of you noticing, Wonwoo had become the first person you looked for at the start of every day, and you had become the place he returned to at the end of it. Neither of you questioned when the castle had stopped feeling like home, and each other had quietly become one instead.

❈ ── 🍃 ── ❈

Several years later, you stood in the kitchen of the house you shared with Wonwoo and eventually made your own. Morning sunlight spilled across the wooden table, where a list of baby names lay abandoned between two half-finished mugs of tea.

Absentmindedly, your hand rested over the gentle curve of your stomach.

Wonwoo looked up from the list and asked if you had any favourites. You tapped the parchment with the end of your quill, thinking, and the name left your lips before you could even reconsider it.

"...Woojin."

You frowned slightly, almost amused by yourself. "I don't know why," you admitted. "It just... feels right."

He looked at the name for a long moment before a small smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. "I like it too. It somehow feels perfect."

Neither of you questioned it. Some things had long since stopped needing explanations.

Outside, Seol tore happily through the garden after a fluttering butterfly, barking with the same boundless enthusiasm she had since she was a puppy. You watched her through the window until you felt familiar hands settle gently around your waist from behind.

"You've been standing too long, baby," Wonwoo murmured against your ear, pressing a small kiss to your jaw.

"I'm pregnant, not made of glass."

"I know," he said, guiding you back toward your chair anyway, one hand settling over yours where it rested against your stomach.

"You fuss too much, honey," you said, though there was no real complaint in it.

"So I've been told."

You laughed softly and turned in your seat to face him. He knelt without a word, the way he always did lately, resting his cheek on your stomach a moment, like he was listening for something.

You laughed softly and turned in your seat to look at him properly. He caught your gaze almost immediately.

"Baby," he said, kissing over the curve of your stomach, "can you tell your mama to stop staring at me?"

You let out an indignant laugh. "I think I’m allowed to stare at my handsome husband."

The faintest blush made his ears turn red. You smiled, softer now, and settled your hand over his where it rested against your stomach.

"You're going to be such a wonderful father, Won." You said it so simply, like you already knew, and subconsciously you did. "I just know it."

For a moment he only looked at you, like he couldn't quite find the words for what that did to him. Then he straightened, tucked a stray lock of hair behind your ear, before leaning down to meet your lips.

The kiss was slow and careful. One hand cupped your jaw, his thumb brushing gently along your cheek, the other gripping the armrest of the chair to avoid hurting you. When he finally pulled back he only went as far as your forehead, staying close, breathing you in like he wanted to keep this exact moment a little longer.

"I love you," he murmured against your skin, quiet and certain, like it was the easiest true thing he had ever said.

"I know," you smiled, your hand finding his jaw. "I love you too."

His hand found your stomach again unconsciously, just as something shifted beneath it. Both of you went still.

"Did you feel that?"

A small kick answered for him. Wonwoo huffed out a soft and a little disbelieving laugh, and bent down to press yet another kiss to your stomach, murmuring something against it too quiet for you to catch. You covered his hand with yours anyway, content to let him have the moment.

Outside, Seol barked triumphantly at nothing at all. Inside, your home was warm with morning light and love, that the two of you had spent years quietly building.

And somewhere in that warmth, already loved before he had taken his first breath, a little boy was about to come home to the family that had always been his.

End.

📖 Before you leave Owl's Library, consider returning this record to the shelves with a reblog so other readers may find it.

He opened his mouth to protest, but you had already waved at the vendor. “Hi, Auntie Yin! Two sesame buns, please—and an extra one with chili if they’re still warm?”

The older woman squinted, then lit up with recognition. “[Name], you’re back! And you brought your prince again.”

Auntie Yin's husband cleared his throat. “Isn’t it Firelord, technically—”

“Pfft,” Auntie Mei waved him off with a flour-dusted hand. “Not when you’re standing in my bread line, young man.”

You laughed, leaning into Zuko as you accepted the little bundle of warm bread. “You see why I come back here?”

Just as he was about to hand in some coins, you had stopped his hand mid-way. He looked at you with a small pout, definitely confused.

“Zuko, no.”

“But—“

“We’re going to fight over this, so no.”

“I don’t like arguing with you,” he murmurs.

You pat his hand solemnly. “I know,” you say. “So I’m paying. End of story.”

He didn’t answer anything else until you raised the bun for him to take the first bite. It was crisp on the outside, soft and buttery in the middle, with little black sesame seeds clinging to his lips, the spice just right to not overpower the actual buttery taste. He closed his eyes briefly.

“I remember this,” he said. “I used to sneak out with my uncle, and we’d get these. He used to say—” His voice caught slightly, swallowing with a pleased nod. “—he used to say the best food in the Fire Nation was always on the street, never behind palace walls.”

Your smile softened.

“He was right.”

You wandered deeper into the market, weaving between stalls draped with silks, lanterns, and every kind of fried thing imaginable. People bumped into each other without apology, children shouted as they chased each other with little wooden dragons, and somewhere nearby, a flute player added a gentle melody to the thick scent of roasted peanuts and smoke.

Zuko tilted his head slightly. “You know all of them.”

You shrugged. “Grew up here. Before my family moved to the coast, we lived two blocks down.”

“Wait, really?”

“Mhm. That stall with the yellow lanterns? That used to be where I bought pickled plums on my way home from school. And that guy—” you pointed to a tall man flipping meat over a roaring fire—“used to give me extra sticks if I said please and didn’t rat him out to his wife for snacking while he cooked. Kind guy, really. Just had a habit of snacking, not that I can blame him because they're really good.”

Zuko looked at you with something like awe. “You never told me any of this.”

“I like keeping some mystery,” you teased, passing him a skewer of fire-grilled mushrooms glistening with glaze. “Try this one. You used to like mushrooms, right?”

“I still like mushrooms.”

“Then don’t make that face and eat it.”

He bit into it, reluctantly. The glaze was spicy, sweet, and smoky all at once. He blinked. “Okay, fine. That’s—really good.”

“Told you.”

You two kept walking, you pausing every so often to wave or chat or haggle for something small—an herbal tea, a dumpling wrapped in banana leaf, or dried fruit you tucked into the folds of your sleeve for later. Zuko stayed mostly quiet, watching you, feeling the tension in his chest unwind inch by inch. Your laugh was infectious, the kind that made other people smile without realizing it. More than once, he found himself smiling too, caught off guard by the sound.

At one point, you dragged him over to a table surrounded by children and old men playing tile games.

“[Name], my girl!” one of them called, holding up a tile. “Still cheating at dragon tiles?”

“Only when you let me win,” you said with a wink.

Zuko stood beside you, bemused. “You’ve played dragon tile in public?”

“She won in public,” one of the elders cackled. “Took my whole snack allowance for the week.”

You handed over a few coins with a mock-guilty face. “Here, I owe you for that.”

“Isn’t there a law that states it’s illegal to play mahjong in public?”

...

"I don't know, is there?"

Before he could dwell on the thought for too long, you had already been ushering Zuko to the next stop. “You’ve been in more street fights than I have.”

“You’d be surprised what people will bet when they think a girl in ribbons doesn’t know what she’s doing.”

“I think I married a con artist.”

You gave him a pleased smile. “Took you this long to figure that out?”

You rounded a quieter corner of the market as the last of the sun dipped behind the rooftops. Lanterns glowed in the gathering dusk, and music trickled through the air. You led him to a little bench tucked between two carts, one selling sticky rice and the other spiced nuts. You flopped down with a sigh, tugging him beside you.

For a while, you two just sat.

Zuko leaned back, watching the lanterns sway in the breeze.

“This was… good.”

You bumped your shoulder against his. “You don’t always have to be Firelord, you know.”

“I kind of do,” he said, but it was quiet.

“You kind of don’t. Not with me, at least.”

He turned to look at you. “I don’t think I ever realized how much I missed this kind of quiet.”

You hummed. “That’s what I’m here for. To remind you.”

Zuko hesitated for a moment, then rested his hand on yours, lacing your fingers together, his finger idly playing with the ring on yours. It's nice, he thinks, just being with you like this. The market was bustling around you, but for a moment, it all faded—just a man and his beloved, full of street food and soft lantern light, sharing a bench and a memory and the kind of peace he was still learning to let himself have.

📩 Inbox — Prof. K. Chansung [email protected]

Subject: Feature Assignment: SVT Centennial Piece

Hi Miss Choi,

Hope your midterms haven’t buried you (yet). As discussed in class, your next assignment for Journalism 321: Feature Writing and Human Interest will be a long-form piece scheduled for the Spring Campus Review.

You’ve been assigned to cover a unique and timely subject: SVT Fraternity — 100 Years of Brotherhood, Legacy, and Change.

As one of the oldest Greek organizations on campus, Sigma Veta Tau has a deep, complex history, complete with controversies, reform efforts, and an undeniable cultural impact. We’re looking for a feature that goes beyond surface-level coverage. Dig into what’s kept this fraternity alive for a century. What traditions have endured? What’s evolved? And, more importantly, what sets it apart today?

You’ll need to:

Conduct multiple interviews (current members, alumni, faculty, campus historians)

Attend at least 2 upcoming SVT events (calendar attached)

Submit a first draft by May 14

Final copy due May 21 at 11:59 PM

This is a high visibility assignment. Our editorial board will be reviewing it for inclusion in the commemorative issue. I trust you to bring your usual insight, edge, and voice to the piece. Reach out if you need access to archives or faculty contacts.

Looking forward to what you uncover. Best, Professor Kang Chansung. Feature Writing Instructor College of Journalism & Communication [email protected]

——

——

{...}

Interview Excerpt: Vice President Yoon Jeonghan — Sigma Veta Tau Member, Class of 2017

Sitting across from Yoon Jeonghan, one quickly learns that SVT’s charm isn’t just in its brick-covered walls or century-old traditions. It’s in the people, specifically, the ones who manage to be both infuriatingly smug and surprisingly sincere in the same breath.

When I ask Jeonghan what has kept Sigma Veta Tau alive for a century, he doesn’t hesitate.

“We evolve. Not always gracefully, but we do,” he says, arms crossed behind his head, posture too relaxed for the gravity of the topic. “That’s what people don’t get about us. We’re not some relic, we’re a reflection. Of this campus. Of the times. Sometimes a really chaotic reflection, but still.”

Jeonghan is a senior and current vice president of SVT, known for his sharp tongue, unbothered confidence, and—for better or worse—a reputation for testing boundaries. During our interview, he arrives twenty minutes late with iced coffee in hand and offers an unapologetic shrug. But once the recorder is on, his tone shifts. Beneath the sarcasm is clarity and insight.

“People love to point out our past. Fair,” he says. “But I think what makes us different is that we don’t run from it. We talk about it in meetings. We changed our rush policy. We implemented accountability stuff before the school even asked. The Sigma Veta Tau I joined my freshman year isn’t the same as the one I help lead now. That’s kind of the point.”

I ask him what traditions have endured.

“Too many, probably,” he laughs, then softens. “The alumni bonfire. Every year. No matter what. It’s not about speeches or awards, it’s just people showing up. All ages. No ego. You stand there and realize, ‘Wow, this place has held people together for actual decades.’ That hits.”

What sets SVT apart today, he says, isn’t the house or the parties—it’s the level of ownership.

“We don’t pretend we’ve been perfect. We’ve made mistakes. Some big ones. But we fix them. We show up for each other. We let people change. That’s brotherhood, I think. Or the kind that’s worth keeping around.”

In true Sigma Veta Tau fashion, Jeonghan doesn’t offer the cleanest quote, or the most PR-friendly soundbite. But what he gives is something better: honesty that sounds like it’s been aged, tested, and made real within those 100-year-old walls.

Before leaving, he turns and adds, almost casually:

“Also, I looked really good in most of the photos I sent you. Just saying. You might want to quote that.”

{...}

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