You sat across from him at the table near the far back corner of the library—your usual spot, where the shadows from the high shelves stretched long across the floor, and the scent of parchment and quiet hung thick in the air. There was ink on your fingers again, smudged along your knuckles like paint, and the end of your quill was pressed between your lips, barely moving as you chewed in thought.

Theodore had forgotten how to breathe properly sometime around your third sigh.

“Right,” he murmured, more to himself than you, eyes darting back to the Arithmancy chart between them. The numbers blurred. “So if… if you’re determining the magical core stabilization, you need to—”

You leaned closer.

Just slightly. Just enough that your hair slipped forward, catching the candlelight and igniting in a shade that wasn’t gold, wasn’t brown, wasn’t anything he’d ever seen on another living person. Merlin. That bloody hair. That not-quite-light brown, not-quite-anything hair.

He swallowed thickly. Looked down. Counted the lines in the page. Focus. Numbers. Equations. Anything but the warmth of your knee brushing his under the table.

“—you need to carry the magical constant across the central line of the—” His voice faltered. Died. He cleared his throat, tried again, “The central… component. You see?”

You looked up at him then, head tilted just slightly, lips parting as if to speak but not yet. Your eyes—Merlin, your eyes—searching his, too intently. Too knowingly.

Theodore dropped his gaze, heart slamming against his ribs. What was happening to him?

This was you. Draco’s sister. He remembered the first time he saw you, clinging to the edge of your brother’s robes in that oversized cloak, first year eyes wide and unafraid. You’d smiled at him, awkward and gap-toothed. He hadn’t known it then, but something in him had shifted—made space for you in some quiet, hidden place.

And now? Now, you were sixteen and every step you took wrecked something inside him. He was no longer your second older brother in everything but blood. No. No, he couldn’t even lie to himself anymore.

“I…” he began, fingers twitching against the edge of the parchment. He almost reached out. Almost tucked that stray lock of hair behind your ear, just to feel it. Just once. “You should—” He faltered. “You should tie your hair up if you’re going to lean in like that.”

It came out more breath than voice, more ache than suggestion.

Because every boy had noticed you. Theodore had seen the stares, heard the murmurs in corridors, the way other sixth-years talked about you when they didn’t know he was listening. And it burned. It fucking burned.

You were off-limits. A rule etched into his mind since he was thirteen. But his hands didn’t know rules. His heart didn’t obey bloodlines.

He looked up at you again. Slowly. Carelessly. You smiled—and he was done for.

“Cazzo,” he muttered under his breath, pinching the bridge of his nose.

You arched an eyebrow. “What?”

“Nothing,” he said, trying for indifference but it landed somewhere between reverent and ruined. “Just… the numbers.”

Liar.