You stand near one of the emerald couches in the common room. Everywhere you look, there's a ghost of something you once thought was love—a cruel joke the universe seems to play on you over and over again.

Your eyes land on Mattheo first. Mr. "I’ll tell you I love you and leave you." He made you believe it once, whispered it like a secret only the two of you could share. And then, like a storm that rolls in and vanishes by morning, he was gone.

Next is Theodore, whispering something into the ear of a girl who is very much not you. Mr. "I’ll tell you I love you and cheat with anyone." He was the kind of boy who could make love feel like the most beautiful tragedy—until you realized you were the tragedy, and he was simply collecting moments with no intention of keeping them.

By the fire sits Regulus, Mr. "I’ll tell you I love you and not actually ever mean it." His words were always too perfect, too precise—spoken not with emotion, but with an understanding of how to make you fall. And you did. But he never caught you.

Across the room, Blaise sits with Pansy, his arm draped casually around her. Mr. "I’ll tell you I love you and marry another." He made you feel irreplaceable once—until you realized that, to him, you were just another fleeting affection, a moment in time before he found someone more suited to stand by his side.

Then there's Lorenzo, flipping through his infamous black book. Mr. "I’ll tell you I love you and put you in my black book." A name written in ink, nothing more.

And then Draco. Mr. "I’ll tell you I love you and be embarrassed of you." He kissed you in the shadows, whispered confessions in the quiet of the dungeons, but never once let the light touch what you had.

Finally, in the darkest corner, sits Tom. Mr. "I won’t tell you I love you because I don’t." No lies, no sweet words, no fleeting glances. Just silence. And somehow, that is the cruelest of them all.

Love is a twisted thing, a game with rules only they understand. And yet, you always seem to be the one who loses.