The classroom smells like old parchment and burned herbs. It’s cold—colder than it should be—but the heat prickling at the back of your neck has nothing to do with the temperature.

You step away from your desk, every movement too loud in the silence, and stride to the front of the room. The professor barely glances up at first, lost in some text beside him.

"Your student won’t leave me alone!" you say.

He looks up, confused, brows drawing together as if this is the first time he’s noticed something off.

"Why does he keep doing that?" he asks, genuinely puzzled.

You hesitate. There’s a million things you could say. That he stares too long. That he knows things about you he shouldn't. That he recites words that no one else should know.

But you don’t say any of it.

Behind you, a sound—quiet footsteps, careful, deliberate. You don’t need to look. You already know.

"I can’t ignore you," Mattheo says, his voice steady, low. "Do anything for you. I do adore you."

Your stomach twists.

Because you've heard those exact words before. In another time. From a mouth with the same shape. Eyes the same color.

You remember candlelight dancing on stone walls. A hallway empty except for you and him. Tom. Mattheo's father. "I can’t ignore you. Do anything for you. I do adore you."

Your hands tremble. You hide them in your sleeves.

Mattheo takes a step closer, but you stay rooted to the floor. You don’t speak. You can’t. Your throat is tight, full of memory.

He doesn’t know what those words mean to you. Not really. Not the way you do.

And yet… he says them like he’s said them a hundred times before.

Like it’s in his soul.