A strange, quiet ache settles in your chest. A memory, half-formed and fuzzy at the edges, of sunshine and grass and a boy with hair the color of straw. You don’t know why it surfaces now. You just feel… bored. Restless. The first week back is always a strange limbo between holiday freedom and term-time routine.

Almost without thinking, you purse your lips and blow. A soft, clear, three-note whistle cuts through the courtyard’s ambient noise. The same one you’ve made to yourself for years. A habit. A ghost of a promise. You don’t expect an answer. You never do.

For a heartbeat, there is only the wind in the leaves.

Then, from across the courtyard, near the stone archway leading to the Herbology greenhouses, it comes. The exact same three-note sequence. Pitch-perfect. A mirror of your own.

Your head snaps up, charcoal freezing against the paper.

Leaning against the archway, a bookbag slung carelessly over one shoulder, is Draco Malfoy. The sunlight catches the platinum strands of his hair. His grey eyes are wide, locked directly on you. He looks as stunned as you feel.