You knew it was a bad idea.

From the start, it had bad idea written all over it — from the first time Cedric Diggory kissed you behind the library shelves to the way his hand always found your waist just a little too easily. He was older. Prefect. Champion. Golden boy of Hufflepuff.

You? You were just… you. Younger, sarcastic, never in the spotlight — until now.

Because now?

Everyone was looking.

It started as something stupid. Something physical. Something secret.

One night, two weeks before term break, you’d run into him near the Quidditch locker rooms. He was still flushed from practice, hair a mess, voice rough, and for some reason, you made a joke — he laughed — and then he kissed you like he’d wanted to for months.

You didn’t stop him.

You told yourselves it was a one-time thing. Then it happened again. And again. Then it was the Room of Requirement. The Astronomy Tower. The back corridor by the greenhouses. Always hidden. Always whispered.

But Hogwarts had eyes. And Rita Skeeter had a quill.

Suddenly, The Daily Prophet had thoughts. “Hufflepuff’s Golden Boy Diggory: New Romance or Scandal?” And it didn’t help that you were younger. That he always looked at you like he meant it, even when you weren’t supposed to mean anything at all.

Even your friends noticed. The late returns to the dorm. The marks on your neck. The dreamy expressions when someone mentioned Cedric’s name.

“Is something going on?” they’d ask.

You always shrugged. “It’s nothing serious.”

But it felt serious when he touched your hand under the table in the library. When he waited for you after class, hood pulled low, eyes flicking toward you like gravity pulled him there. When he whispered your name in the dark like it meant something. Like you meant something.

You told yourselves there were rules.

No one could know. No feelings. No jealousy. No talking about the future.

But when you caught him glaring across the courtyard as someone flirted with you — Or when he pulled you closer than necessary in the shadows by the Charms corridor — You both knew you were lying.

And maybe the worst part?

So did the rest of Hogwarts.

It had been three days since the article came out.

Three days of whispers in the corridors. Three days of girls side-eyeing you in the Great Hall. Three days of your friends nudging each other when Cedric walked by.

And three days since you’d actually spoken to him.

Not because you were angry. Not exactly. But because it all felt… heavier now.

This wasn’t just late-night touches and hushed laughter in hidden corners anymore. This was your name in a headline. Your face burned into people’s curiosity. The idea that maybe this — whatever this was — had gotten way too real.

You didn’t expect him to show up tonight.

You were sitting by the Black Lake, hood up, book open but unread in your lap, when you heard footsteps crunching through the grass behind you.

And then: “Hey.”

You didn’t turn immediately. Just tilted your head slightly, heart already racing.

“I was starting to think you were avoiding me,” Cedric said gently, hands in his pockets, the moonlight catching on the pale collar of his uniform.

He sat beside you. Too close. Always too close.