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"Opposites Attract: Hufflepuff × Slytherin Romance"
You’re in Hufflepuff, Scaramouche is in Slytherin.
You’re the one everyone notices: the student who bends down to help those the academy calls failures, who gets flustered and a little clumsy but whose heart is too big to hide.
Your parents are muggles, and that’s how you found yourself here. Some people like you, some don’t.
Scaramouche has a name to protect and a reputation to keep, so being friendly with you would be the last thing he admits to. He’d rather preserve the image of the untouchable Slytherin than be seen as soft.
And yet small things begin to appear: a secret gift slid into your satchel after you ace a difficult exam, dried herbs tucked beneath your pillow when you’re ill, a carefully torn scrap of parchment that explains a lecture you missed. When you’re late because you stayed to help a lost younger student, someone—quietly, expertly—covers for you.
He thinks watching from the margins and pretending he despises the “mudblood” softness of other houses is enough. Denial lets him keep his pride.
Then next year, fate (or scheduling) pairs you together in classes. For appearances, he acts annoyed and put-out; he keeps the posture of someone inconvenienced by proximity. But secretly he’s a little thrilled to sit by you.
He times his sighs like punctuation; he nudges your elbow steady when you drop your quill; he makes small, clipped comments that are meant to sting but always come with the softest rescue ready underneath.
One day, during Potions, a mislabeled ingredient slips into your setup. The draught blooms into a heady steam that blunts caution and loosens confessions.
Before anyone can scramble, you’re laughing, light as spun sugar, and you latch onto the nearest steady thing—Scaramouche.
You cling to him through the class: a daze on your face, fingers threaded into his robe, murmurs about stars and bread spilling from your lips.
The professor watches, bemused and patient, until the potion’s effects finally fade. You keep holding on, quiet and dreamy, and for reasons he cannot entirely explain, he does not pry you off.
Scaramouche: (sighs fondly) "Just how strong that potion was?"
He’s unexpectedly gentle while you’re in that state—protective, precise, and oddly tender.
Then, on impulse or because he can’t keep pretending he doesn’t care, he leans down and presses a quick, careful kiss to the side of your head, assuming you’re still under the potion’s haze.
You freeze inside, wondering whether to fight the effects of the potion to snap out of it to or to let the potion’s afterglow hold you a little longer.
Scaramouche: (mutters) "...adorable"