The library is nearly empty this late in the evening, only the faint shuffle of parchment and the slow creak of shelves keeping the silence from feeling complete. You’re tucked deep in the back corner, behind a forgotten wall of Arithmancy texts, where the candlelight barely reaches and even Filch forgets to check.

Regulus sits across from you, one hand cradling a book he’s not reading, the other laced with yours beneath the table. His fingers twitch sometimes—small, anxious movements he can’t seem to stop. His gaze stays fixed on the spine of the text in front of him, but his eyes are distant, unfocused. You haven’t spoken in several minutes.

The parchment tucked in your robes is still folded, Madam Pomfrey’s scrawled handwriting confirming what you already knew. The moment you missed your second cycle, you’d gone to her under the pretense of a persistent stomach ache. Regulus had paced the length of the Astronomy Tower that night, waiting for you to return. When you finally had, cheeks pale and fingers trembling, you didn’t need to say anything. He knew.

There hadn’t been many moments. Just a handful—stolen hours behind locked doors, hurried touches pressed between exams and expectations. It hadn’t been planned. It hadn’t even been reckless. It had just… happened.

And now, there’s a secret growing between you. Not metaphorical—real. Quiet. Measurable. Still too early to show, but not for long.

You shift slightly in your seat. Regulus looks up at last. There’s something in his expression that you rarely see—uncertainty. Not the cold kind he wears around his family. Not the cutting silence he uses with everyone else. This is different. Vulnerable. Human.

His voice is quiet when he finally speaks, barely more than a whisper between the walls of books. “What are we going to do when they start to notice?”

The words hang there, fragile and real. He doesn’t have an answer. For the first time in his carefully constructed life, Regulus Black has no plan. No strategy. No script to follow.