#teaser!

Remus checked his own watch. It was impossible to tell the time in this miserably dark house. A quarter to seven. Tonks, Kingsley, and Mad-Eye were due to arrive any moment. 

“Should be quiet soon. I suspect it will be the usual bout of chaos.” Sirius seemed to smile knowingly at his words. Remus furrowed his brows. “Why–” 

The blood curdling shrieks of Mrs. Black’s portrait cut him off. 

“SCUM! BLOOD TRAITORS! FILTH IN MY ANCESTRAL HOME—” 

“Oh, shut up you old cow!” Sirius growled as he ran to quiet his mother. Remus left the sitting room, ready to help with the arduous task of shutting up the portrait. The sound of the door closing could be heard just through the screams, followed by the hurried pleasantries of Mrs. Weasley rushing forward to greet their guests. 

 When Remus rounded the corner into the entrance hall, he saw the group of the hour standing there. Moody was preoccupied rebolting the many locks on the front door. Kingsley stood next to him in regal robes of midnight blue, and the purple head of Tonks could just be spotted, the rest of her hidden in Molly’s embrace. 

Remus made to follow Sirius, his hand was already resting on the smooth wooden banister, but he stopped dead in his tracks when he spotted the last figure. 

In the center of the entry way stood Y/N. She watched Molly greet everyone with a warm patience, a traveling cloak fastened around her neck and a duffle bag slung over her shoulder. 

“Finally got a hold of the new recruit." Moody said gruffly, shuffling past, his wooden leg ‘thunking’ against the floor with each step. Remus stared dumbfounded as Molly took Y/N’s hands. 

“Ohhh, you must be Y/N! It's so good to finally meet you!” 

“Likewise!” Said Y/N with a warm smile. 

“My, my, I did meet your parents on a few occasions and I must say, you look remarkably like your mother!” Remus noticed the way Y/N stiffened at Molly’s words, almost imperceptible, her smile still frozen in place. 

“Yeah, before all the booze I suppose,” She let out an awkward breathy laugh that no one returned. Everyone looked at their shoes and Molly dropped her hands. 

“Yes…well, you know Remus and Sirius? Or Professor Lupin to you I suppose?” Molly gestured back towards Remus. Sirius descended the stairs behind him, the echoing shrieks of his mother finally silenced. Y/N’s smile stayed fixed in place as she gave Remus a cordial nod, but he couldn't miss the fiery defiance in her gaze. 

As he locked eyes with her, he was transported back to his quarters at Hogwarts, to just days after Voldemort’s return. 

He sat at his writing desk, staring at the blank piece of parchment as if it were a death warrant he was doomed to sign. His slanted handwriting in deep black ink stated the absolute basic intel sent to every prospective Order member. But it was the last part he couldn't bring himself to write, the final few lines he could not find the words to create. 

With a deep, sinking sensation in his gut, he had settled on this; 

I doubt that anything I write here will dissuade you. On the contrary, I fear my words may push you if you have not taken the initiative to join the war effort already. Out of nothing prior except concern for your own safety, I urge you not to do this.

Sincerely, 

Remus John Lupin.

And here she stood now, whether he liked it or not. 

He felt the disappointment wash over him. A little candle of hope had burned apprehensively inside of him; a hope that perhaps she would stay away from this fight, that he could put his mistakes behind him. But Y/N had flown in like a breeze that snuffed it out. 

“Remus is fine,” He offered in what he hoped was a polite and cordial manner. 

Sirius clapped him on the back, dragging him forcefully from his thoughts. “Especially since she’ll be staying here,” He said it jovially, with a wide mischievous grin.

Remus turned to his friend dumbfounded. His confession to Sirius had gone, mercifully, untouched in the recent weeks, buried under the urgency of Order work. But Sirius, as always, never did like to let things go. His friend simply shrugged at the horrified look in Remus’s eyes and motioned to the duffle over Y/N’s shoulder 

"London rent is expensive, even you must know that Remus!” 

“Blimey, I’m starving!” Said Tonks, nearly tripping over the troll foot umbrella stand in her hurry to escape the tense entry hall. 

“Always thinking with your stomach, dear cousin.” Sirius sighed, following her towards the kitchen. The rest of the party followed suit. 

Kingsley patted Remus’s shoulder in greeting as he passed. “Remus, sorry to hear about the Defense Against the Dark Arts position.” 

With the ministry now desperate to depose Dumbledore by any means available, Remus’s position was quickly terminated. Doloris Umbridge made quick work of some new anti-werewolf legislation which not only lost him the job at Hogwarts, but the following smear campaign made any other form of employment impossible. Remus did his best to shrug casually. The loss of the position he loved so dearly still ached. 

“More time to focus on what’s important these days.” Kingsley patted his arm again.

“Thats the spirit,” He followed Tonks and Sirius to the kitchen. Remus was about to depart himself when a sharp ‘Crack’ near the bottom of the stairs caught his attention. Mrs. Weasley shrieked. 

“Oh! How many times have I told you not to do that in the house!” 

“Only about fifteen,” said the one Remus took to be George.

“Yeah, we don’t actually listen to you till you get to about twenty.” Said, what by process of elimination, had to be Fred. 

Before she could yell at them further, the rest of the youths came running down the stairs like a pack of wild elephants.  

“It’s not Harry, is it?” Cried Ron before he even reached the landing.

“God, Ron, what will you do without your boyfriend?” Ginny huffed from behind him.

“Sorry to disappoint,” said Y/N with a cordial wave. 

“I assume you remember Y/N from school?” Mrs. Weasley asked. The kids muttered their acknowledgement. “Now, girls, why don't you show Y/N to her room?” Molly suggested. Remus watched Y/N follow the girls upstairs, all of them properly introducing themselves, Hermoine taking Y/N’s bag. 

Molly turned to him with her warm, maternal smile and graciously led him into the kitchen. Remus did his best to leave his lingering anxieties about this arrangement in the entry hall.

Intro: The Art of First Impressions (or lack thereof)

Park Sunghoon prides himself on being calm and composed. 

At least that’s what he tells himself, if you generously take out the part where he’s clumsy, socially catastrophic, and possesses the spatial awareness of a newborn puppy on ice. To the Uni at large, he’s—well, a concept? The campus god, as wattpad core as it sounds, he simply makes it seem that way. The guy who sits in the back of lecture halls looking bored and devastatingly handsome, presumably thinking about complex philosophical theories or his next modeling gig. 

In reality, he’s usually just thinking about whether it is going to rain or stressing over the fact that he held the door open for someone slightly too early, forcing them to do that awkward little run-walk, they were grateful regardless. It’s a fragile ecosystem, really. A reputation built entirely on the fact that he doesn’t talk enough for people to realize he’s actually a massive loser.

Only Sim Jaeyun knew the truth, along with Jay and Heeseung but yeah. Jake knew that Sunghoon isn’t brooding, rather, he’s buffering (as sad as that is). He knows that his oh so cold, mysterious silence is just Sunghoon’s brain playing elevator music (Wii party soundtrack preferably) while he tries to figure out how to function like a human being. 

But tonight, Sunghoon feels good, he feels capable somehow. He’s wearing his favorite gray sweatpants, Jay is making pasta and garlic bread, and the dorm smells like home in the best way possible. He has one job—bring the cups to the living room. Jake had been going on about inviting a chaotic duo he came across at a gaming cafe, who absolutely destroyed him during gaming but that eventually led to him aggressively adopting them into his life out of sheer respect for the carry later.

Sunghoon peels the plastic sleeve off the stack of red Solo cups with a satisfying crinkle, feeling that same surge of confidence, headphones playing his favourite EsDeeKid song (Palaces), letting him vibe, completely blocking out the chatter and laughter outside. He steps out of the kitchenette, the bass in his ears vibrating through his skull, making him feel momentarily infinite. He is the main character in a very low-stakes indie movie, he is cool, he is ready to perceive and be perceived, or so he thinks.

And then his eyes land on the center of the living room, and the soundtrack in his head comes to a screeching, violent-ish halt. He expects noise—he can see Jake’s mouth moving rapidly, gesturing with a ladle like a weapon—but he doesn’t expect you.

You are already there, claiming the space in a way that makes the cramped dorm room feel suddenly, terrifically bright. You’re standing near the beat-up sofa, one sneaker kicked off and overturned on the rug, looking comfortably disheveled in a way that art directors spend hours trying to replicate. You’re in the middle of laughing at something another one of your friends said, and he doesn’t know his name yet—a full-bodied, head-thrown-back kind of laugh that Sunghoon can’t hear over his music but can feel in his chest anyway.

You look effortless, like you didn’t even try, yet somehow succeeded more than anyone else in the room. You’re wearing a simple white tank top tucked into vintage denim that fits perfectly, with a leather jacket slipping casually off one shoulder. Your hair is loose, framing a face that is currently lit up with pure, unadulterated joy, and your eyes are crinkled shut with mirth.

Sunghoon’s brain, usually a well-oiled machine of anxiety and checklists, simply—stops. The music fades into static, and his calm and composed narrative dissolves. Oh, he thinks, his grip on the plastic stack tightening until it crunches. Wow.

He is so busy processing the sudden, violent realization that you might be the prettiest thing he has ever seen that he forgets a fundamental rule of Newtonian physics, Pauli Exclusion Principle: two solid objects cannot occupy the same space at the same time.

One of those objects is his broad, unsuspecting shoulder, the other is the wooden doorframe, and there’s a loud sound of collision—a bone-jarring impact that cuts right through his noise-canceling headphones and jolts his entire skeleton from the teeth down. The shockwave travels instantly to his hands, and the stack of red cups, liberated by the violence of the collision, explodes outward like plastic fireworks. They rain down onto the carpet in a chaotic, clattering cacophony that seems to echo for ten years.

Sunghoon freezes, vibrating with pain, staring blankly at a single red cup spinning sadly near his big toe. Slowly and painfully, he slides his headphones down to his neck. The room has gone dead silent.

The friend you were laughing with—the one with the cat-like eyes, stops mid-sentence, his mouth hanging open. Jake blinks slowly from the couch, profound confusion etched into his features. And you—you turn slowly, eyes wide, the laughter still lingering on your face as you take in the tragedy of the cups and the man currently trying to merge with the drywall.

“Holy shit,” the friend breaks the silence, abandoning his game to lean over the back of the couch, “you good, dude?”

Sunghoon stays very still, he is waiting for one of two things to happen—either for the floorboards to mercifully open up and swallow him whole, or for his body to spontaneously combust from the sheer, blinding force of his own humiliation. Neither happens, instead, the throbbing ache in his shoulder radiates down his arm, a dull, pulsing reminder that he is not, in fact, the protagonist of a cool indie film, he is a hazard.

Say something, his brain screams, make a joke, be charming. Recover for fucks sake. 

“I’m good,” Sunghoon manages, though his voice comes out about three octaves higher than usual. He clears his throat, “I’m—yeah. Totally fine. Just—slipped.”

“You slipped?” The friend—Jungwon, he remembers Jake calling him—asks, eyebrows shooting up, “into the doorframe? Vertically?”

“The carpet,” Sunghoon says, pointing an accusing finger at the perfectly standard rug, “it’s deceptive man.”

From the floor, a soft snort erupts, It’s you. You aren’t looking at him with pity, which is what he expects. You’re grinning—a wide, genuine expression that scrunches your nose—and before Sunghoon can process the movement, you’ve dropped to a crouch in front of him to help with the plastic disaster zone.

“Deceptive carpet,” you repeat, the corner of your mouth twitching as you reach for a cup that rolled near his ankle. 

Sunghoon’s ears are burning. He can feel the heat spreading down his neck, violent and undeniable. He drops to his knees out of a desperate need to avoid looking at Jake, who is currently burying his face in a cushion.

“I mean—,” Sunghoon mumbles, grabbing cups with frantic, uncoordinated hands, “It’s physics. Momentum, y’know?”

“Right, physics,” you drawl, and your voice is warm, teasing in a way that makes his stomach do a weird flip. You hand him a stack of cups you’ve gathered, “well, try not to fight any more inanimate objects tonight, okay? The dorm deposit is expensive.”

Your fingers brush against his knuckles as you pass the stack. His skin practically zaps where you touched him. Sunghoon flinches like he’s been electrocuted, nearly dropping the cups all over again. He looks up, terrified, and finds your face inches from his. Up close, you’re even intimidatingly prettier. You smell like vanilla and leather, and your eyes are dancing.

“I’m Y/N, by the way,” you say easily, sitting back on your heels. 

Sunghoon stares at you. He knows he needs to respond. The social contract dictates that he provides his own name in return, it is a simple exchange. Input: Name. Output: Name. But his brain is currently running on a backup generator powered by a single, terrified hamster, and gosh the hamster is tired.

“Uh,” Sunghoon starts, his voice cracking a little, then he clears his throat, “Y/N.”

He nods, “Right, you’re Y/N.”

You look at him, waiting.

“I’m—” Sunghoon trails off, looking at your eyes, they are very pretty. He looks at your mouth, you’re smiling, “I’m—Y/N?” He stops, eyes widening. No, that is incorrect.

“I mean—” He waves a hand frantically, nearly knocking over the stack of cups he just rescued, “You’re Y/N! I’m Sunghoon. Yeah. Yeah—you’re Sunghoon and I’m Y/N—wait.”

He freezes. The sentence hangs in the air between you, defying all logic, space, and time. Did I just steal her identity? The silence that follows is loud. Behind him, he hears Jungwon choke on a laugh, disguising it as a cough. Jake just sighs, a long, mournful sound of a man who has given up on his roommate entirely, and Heeseung doesn’t bother hiding his jolly laugh. 

You blink at him. Then, slowly, that grin widens until it takes up your whole face.

“We’re swapping?” You ask, delighted, “okay—I’ve always wanted to be tall.”

Sunghoon feels his soul attempting to leave his body through his ears, he stands up, he stands up way too fast. His knees pop, adding a nice, crunchy soundtrack to his humiliation.

“I have to wash these,” he announces to the room at large, voice dangerously monotone.

“They were in a plastic sleeve,” Jake points out from the couch, finally turning around to witness the wreckage, “they’re clean bro.”

“Dust!” Sunghoon yells. He doesn’t look back, he can’t, “you can’t see it, but it’s there. It’s everywhere!”

He turns on his heel and flees. There is no other word for it, he practically speed-walks back into the safety of the kitchenette, shoulders hunched up to his ears, clutching the red cups to his chest, leaving the echo of his dignity—and his name—behind on the living room rug. He rounds the corner, out of sight, and immediately presses his forehead against the cool stainless steel of the fridge. He squeezes his eyes shut, his chest heaving like he just ran a marathon.

“He’s usually—uh—he’s usually not like this,” he hears Jake say in the other room, sounding apologetic.

“He’s funny,” you reply, and Sunghoon can hear the smile in your voice, “I like him.”

Sunghoon slides down the front of the fridge until he hits the floor, all while he buries his burning face in his hands. He is absolutely, irrevocably doomed.

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