It starts with laughter echoing down the corridor—yours and James’. The castle is quiet otherwise, midnight thick in the air. You’re breathless from running, his hand still loosely tangled with yours when 𝘔𝘤𝘨𝘰𝘯𝘢𝘤𝘢𝘭𝘭 finds you near the fourth-floor stairwell.

“Out. Of. Bed,” she says, each word a death knell.

You both wince.

Detention, naturally. Midnight. Trophy room.

“Could be worse,” he said, glancing over. “Could be FiIch instead of 𝘔𝘤𝘨𝘰𝘯𝘢𝘤𝘢𝘭𝘭. Or, you know, separate detentions.”

You rolled your eyes. “Maybe then I’d actually get something done.”

He grinned like he’d just won the Quidditch Cup. “But then I wouldn’t get to watch you frown at smudged fingerprints for two hours.”

You flicked your wand toward him without thinking, sending a gentle blast of air that ruffled his already impossibly messy hair. He gasped in mock betrayal. “Did you just hex me? In front of all these innocent trophies?”

“That was barely a breeze—”

He didn’t wait. A second later, you were ducking a harmless spark of blue light, laughing as it grazed past your shoulder and fizzled harmlessly against the wall. Soon enough, the trophy room echoed with harmless spells and breathless laughter, your wand clashing with his in bursts of light that lit up the gold-plated names behind the glass.

Eventually, you both collapsed on the floor, panting, flushed, your wands forgotten between you.

For a while, neither of you spoke. The silence stretched, but it wasn’t uncomfortable. The firelight from the torches cast warm shadows across his face, softening the angles, making him look… different. Not the loud, confident Gryffindor everyone saw. Just James.

“You were quiet tonight,” you murmured.

He glanced over at you, eyes darker in the dim light. “It’s easier, sometimes, when everything slows down.”

You nodded. “Yeah.”

A pause. Then—quietly—“My mum used to stay up with me when I had nightmares. She’d make me cocoa and let me sleep by the fire. Don’t know why I thought of that just now.”