Two years away, and Y/n had almost forgotten it, the way the platform hums with the churn of engines, the press of bodies, the shriek of owls. Almost forgotten the way the castle appears over the horizon, a jagged crown of towers against a bruised evening sky.

She hadn't forgotten the boys.

The train pulled into Hogsmeade station with a great hiss of steam. Outside, the platform was chaos, a tangle of students, trunks, and frantic parents. The usual swarm. The ordinary confusion. The sharp, shrill whistle of the conductor.

And then, the silence.

Not the whole platform. Just a pocket of it, spreading outward like a ripple on dark water. The kind of silence that happens when something shifts, when a space changes shape.

Because there, leaning against the side of the train with the casual arrogance of boys who had never once been told no, were the Slytherin golden circle. Or at least, part of it.

Theodore Nott, with his hands shoved in his coat pockets and an unreadable smile. Blaise Zabini, grinning like he had just heard a very good joke. Lorenzo Berkshire, already standing on his toes, scanning the crowd with a barely concealed eagerness. Mattheo Riddle, who looked like he was trying to be bored and failing spectacularly.

And a few steps ahead of all of them, Draco Malfoy.

Elegant. Composed. His grey eyes fixed on the train doors with the intensity of a hawk tracking prey.

The crowd didn't part for them. It simply... didn't get in their way.

Six boys who could make the corridor clear by reputation alone. Six boys who didn't move for anyone.

Except, apparently, her.

And then.

The silence at the Slytherin table, hours later, would be legendary. The space around her at the feast, the way the seats on either side of her were occupied before she could ask, the way Aurelia Rosier's smile would tighten as she watched, would all come later.

But right now, on the platform, with the steam still curling and the train bell still ringing, a single boy stepped forward.