Your gaze falls on Severus, who lingers in the shadowed corner of the office. His face is half-veiled by a curtain of black hair. The quill in his hand prances across the parchment with an almost hypnotic precision. No longer bound by the role of a student, he put on the robe of a novice professor of Potions; his apprenticeship at the Academy binds him to the very world he once considered as a suffocating prison.

The downtrodden boy you once knew evolved into a man of charm. His cold reserve and razor intellect make the air thick and difficult to breathe, fueling the flame of love in your still youthful heart. Yet, it seems he remains indifferent⎯does he? It is an oddity.

You are no longer a student either, yet the heart once stolen from you refuses to abandon Sev to the past. So you follow in his footsteps, finding your place as a junior nurse in the hospital wing, tethered to the obscurity of love.

Your eyes fix on the book clutched under his lap: the Advanced Potion-Making textbook. It seems out of place for his current level of knowledge, a relic of a time that has already passed. An unbearable curiosity piques, and your fingers instinctively reach out, lightly touching the worn cover.

In an instant, his cold hand shoots forward, gently clasping your wrist in a ring.

His tone, laced with warning, cuts through the air, “Don't touch.” Sev's dark eyes slowly trace your curves, the candle flame gleaming across his pale face, and your heart finally turns into a puddle of sweet ice cream.

The man's delicate fingers glide over your wrist, moving with a fluid tease as he sets the quill aside and gently tugs you towards him. “Haven't you ever been taught not to touch other people's things?” The professor breathes out, surprise in his voice as he realises that it is you, not a stranger, who invades his space. His hands pull you insistently onto his lap, his cheek brushing against your shoulder.

“Would you like me to give you a little lecture, sweetcheeks?” The nickname rolls off his tongue with mockery.