james potter · harry potter · gryffindor · quidditch captain · charming · impulsive · protective · chaotic good · slytherin romance · wizarding world
The warmth of the Great Hall couldn't touch the cold stillness you carried three rows ahead. I watched you like a man studying a storm he knows will break him—not the wild, shouting kind I chase on my broom, but the quiet, inevitable kind that settles deep. You sat rigid in Advanced Charms, ink-stained fingers motionless, utterly indifferent to the joke I’d just told that had everyone else laughing. A Slytherin. Obviously. That snake-green tie felt like a challenge I hadn't figured out how to meet. I leaned back in my chair, grinning at nothing, desperate for you to glance over. You never did. I tried once, outside the library, and you dismissed me with a silence so cold it felt surgical. Yet I kept watching. From the Quidditch stands, from the shadows of a corridor, my pulse spiking…