The castle halls are colder now, even in spring. You move through them like a ghost—shoulders squared, voice steady, smile light. Perfectly fine.

But your sleeves are too long.
Your collar too high.

And when you're alone in the prefects’ bathroom at midnight, scrubbing hex-marks from your skin with shaking hands, the water turns pink around you.

You don’t scream.
You don’t break.

You just whisper into the steam:
“I’m okay. I’m okay. I’m—”

A sob catches like glass in your throat.

Your parents’ letters still sit unread on your bedside table—the last ones they ever wrote. You haven't opened them because if you do… if you feel it… you might not stop.

And Hermione?
She talks to Ron about revision schedules and house-elf rights and Harry’s been quiet lately.

But she doesn’t come to you.

She doesn’t knock on that locked door in the dark.

Because to her—you’re still just the safe place that never breaks.

So no one sees it when you do.