“Hey,” Taehyung Kim calls quietly, not wanting to scare the Ravenclaw student in the back of the library.
The student jumps, whipping his head around to meet Taehyung’s gaze with a visibly scared look in his eyes. His hair is completely hidden beneath his Ravenclaw beanie, but Taehyung imagines it to be really soft and silky.
“Can I sit here?” Taehyung points to the sofa-chair beside the Ravenclaw’s. “I’m just gonna study and I won’t bother you. All the other seats are taken.”
Now that’s a lie. Almost no one stays behind in Hogwarts during Christmas break, so the two of them are probably the only people in the library right now.
The Ravenclaw blinks up at him owlishly, looking more confused than anything. But he quickly turns away with his pale cheeks dusted a soft pink. Adorable.
Taehyung sighs and just sits down on the sofa-chair when the Ravenclaw doesn’t stop him.
Taehyung digs into his backpack and pulls out his textbook titled Intermediate Transfiguration, a must-read for all third-year students. But he doesn’t care about the stupid book.
All he cares about right now is this Ravenclaw kid. Gossip and mysteries are like the Ravenclaw boy’s second skin; he’s so secretive and quiet that sometimes people just ignore him, but Taehyung’s eyes rarely leave him even in most crowded spaces.
This Ravenclaw kid never talks. Seriously, no one’s ever heard him make a single sound, not even when he’s supposed to practice incantation pronunciation. He is completely silent when he’s supposed to make a presentation to the class, and when Peeves bullies him (it didn’t take long for people to suspect that he really can’t talk). He doesn’t hang out with any student and shies away from every social activity. He wears that beanie even when it’s summer (some people theorize that the boy is bald, at which Taehyung scoffs). The weirdest of all: the boy is a transfer student, and no one knows where he came from.
Taehyung always tries hard not to read the boy’s mind, and to his surprise, he has near perfect control whenever he’s around the boy (and loses control whenever he’s not with the boy).
He glances to the Ravenclaw boy’s direction. Beside the boy’s textbook is his phone, and Taehyung catches him looking back and forth between the screen and the text. Taehyung squints, and sees that the boy is using Google Translate.
What?
“Hey,” Taehyung says, taken over by curiosity. The boy tenses and snatches his phone away. Otherwise the boy doesn’t move or turn around. “Do you not know English?”
The boy remains motionless.
Taehyung, being the social butterfly he is, immediately drags his sofa-chair over so that he’s facing the Ravenclaw boy, who looks a little uneasy and avoids Taehyung’s gaze.
“Are you a foreigner?”
That question goes unanswered as well.
“Must be really tiring using Google Translate.” Taehyung says easily. “But you probably really don’t know anything I’m saying, do you? Not a single bit?”
The boy still doesn’t reply.
“I can teach you!” Taehyung grins widely. He’s told (by Jin hyung) that his smile is really sweet and charming, so he hopes at least the Ravenclaw will feel more at ease. “TaeTae.” He points at himself.
The boy finally looks up, looking as confused as ever.
“I’m TaeTae.” Taehyung repeats, pointing at himself again. He gives the boy another grin.
The boy doesn’t even blink at that.
“Book,” Taehyung points at the boy’s textbook, making sure to make his mouth shape as exaggerated as possible so the boy can mimic him.
The boy mouths the word, but doesn’t make any sound. He looks like he’s trying to memorize the word, and the way his eyebrows are slightly furrowed is adorable.
“Wand,” Taehyung pulls out his wand. It’s pure white and made of holly, which Taehyung brags about whenever he remembers to.
The boy blinks, and glances away. Taehyung follows the boy’s gaze and finds a beautiful carved midnight black wand with elegant markings. That’s definitely the most beautiful wand he’s ever seen.
“Magic,” Taehyung raises his wand, and makes tiny fireworks in the air. Blue and purple sparks erupt before the boy’s eyes. Taehyung points to those fireworks, and grins when he sees a ghost of a smile passes by the Ravenclaw boy’s plump lips. Or maybe that’s Taehyung’s imagination, he’s not sure.
The boy’s mouth moves to mimic Taehyung’s mouth shape, but no sounds come out. He looks cute, like a baby trying to say his first word.
He lets it pass, though, not wanting to scare off the boy. Baby steps.
“You’re getting the hang of it!” Taehyung squeaks happily, probably a little too excited, but the boy just smiles at him, not as bothered as before. “I have to go now, sorry. Meet me here tomorrow?”
The boy’s look of confusion returns.
“Okay, here.” Taehyung grabs his quill and a random parchment and with big, loopy letters, he writes his name the words Meet me here tomorrow. He stuffs it into the boy’s hand, which is very small and cute (not that Taehyung’s admiring the boy’s hand like a creep). “You can translate that. I’ll see you, yeah?”
He doesn’t say goodbye, because the boy wouldn’t get it anyway. He hops out of the library with that smile plastered over his face.
“Earphones,” Taehyung points at his earphones the next day. The Ravenclaw boy simply stares.
“Scarf,” Taehyung wraps his Hufflepuff scarf around the Ravenclaw boy the day after that. The boy flinches and turns away.
“Butterbeer,” Taehyung pours the drink into the Ravenclaw boy’s empty water bottle on the fourth day. The Ravenclaw boy glances over at Taehyung and continues to do his homework, ignoring him. Not that Taehyung minds. He does hope that wherever the boy came from has Butterbeer too, because if that's true it would be a huge shame.
“Stars,” Taehyung points at the night sky behind the window a week later. The Ravenclaw boy follows his gaze, and a look of longing passes over his eyes. Taehyung is dying to know what the boy is thinking about right now, but invading the boy’s privacy seems too wrong.
“Music,” Taehyung connects his speaker to his phone and plays A Sky Full of Stars by Coldplay two weeks later. He sings along with the music, and dramatically puts all his emotions into his voice, making unnecessary ad libs.
To his surprise, the Ravenclaw boy snaps his head up from his parchment and stares at Taehyung with wide eyes, completely shocked and mesmerized. Taehyung smiles widely; he’s been told by many people that he has an amazing, almost breathtakingly beautiful, voice, but he’s never been that happy that his voice can move someone else.
“Do you know Coldplay too? They inspired me so much.” Taehyung says after the song ends.
The boy’s eyes remain wide, unfocused and completely shocked, and Taehyung frowns a little at that. Is something wrong? Did the song offend him or something?
But then the boy gives him the sweetest smile he’s ever seen. The boy’s already-thin eyes disappear into crescent shapes, and there’s a dimple on the boy’s right cheek that Taehyung didn’t notice before. The laugh he makes is squeaky and high-pitched, and for some reason he looks like a cute kitty: cute and tiny (he’s half a head shorter than Taehyung uwu) and shy and has the best smile.
Taehyung laughs along with the boy just to make the boy smile more.
“Dance,” Taehyung says, and stands up from where he’s crouching and adjusting the volume on his speaker. The boy watches him curiously, giving Taehyung his full attention, much different from the shy boy Taehyung first met.
And he starts dancing, not singing, just dancing silently and making his body move fluidly to every beat of the music. He lets his eyes fall close and his mind quiet down as he surrenders completely to instinct and muscle memory. His every inhale and exhale is both calculated and improvised, and his every movement like water.
He stops when the music stops, and opens his eyes again to see the boy gaping at him, his jaw hanging open cutely. “Dance,” Taehyung repeats, a little breathless this time, and gives the boy a boxy smile.
The boy’s expression is completely taken by amazement and fascination, even more apparent than when Taehyung played him music the other day. There’s some kind of desire behind those eyes, and Taehyung is, not for the first time, thankful that he has the ability to read people like a book.
“Me and my friends love to dance and sing.” Taehyung says, smiling at the boy. “I’m obviously not the best dancer, but Hoseok hyung makes it fun. Yoongi hyung writes the best music. Jungkook’s pretty good at dancing too, actually. Seokjin’s just a pretty face to look at.” He laughs at his own joke.
The Ravenclaw remains still, blinking hard like he’s actually trying to understand what Taehyung’s saying. Taehyung continues. “I never told other people this, but I’m scared of the day when we all stop dancing and singing. The day we drift apart. It would feel so much like dying, you know? And unlike when you actually die, it’ll hurt. I’m really scared.”
The Ravenclaw boy must have sensed the weight of Taehyung’s words, because there’s a slight frown that looks suspiciously like concern.
“I heard somewhere that someone famous said that for a dancer, the first and most painful death would be when they stop dancing. I really hope today won’t be my last day dancing, but who knows, lots of things can happen in a day.” Taehyung sighs, rubbing at his temple a little tiredly. “I guess I’m only rambling because you don’t know a word I say. It’s kind of mean, actually. I promise I’ll tell you when you know more English.”
The boy tilts his head in confusion.
“You seemed to enjoy it a lot,” Taehyung notes. He dramatically bows and offers a hand like a gentleman. “I mean dancing. Do you like to dance, too?”
Upon hearing the word, the boy’s eyes brighten by a thousand times. He nods fervently and doesn’t hesitate to accept Taehyung’s outstretched hand.
Taehyung plays A Sky Full of Stars again and sways with the music, improvising dance moves on the spot. The boy watches him and tries to copy his every move, which he does surprisingly well.
The boy’s blue Ravenclaw beanie falls of at some point, and Taehyung tries not to gape at what he sees underneath. The boy’s hair is softer than the most expensive velvet and is a vibrant orange-pink. It suits the boy so much that Taehyung has to force himself with all his might not to coo or squeak like a stupid fangirl.
“Dance,” Taehyung says when the song ends. “This is called dance.”
“Dance,” The Ravenclaw boy says with a strong unrecognizable accent, and Taehyung realizes that this is the first time he’s ever heard the boy utter a single word.
Taehyung is smiling the next second, so much that the muscles in his cheeks start to hurt a little. “Dance,” He says again, hoping to hear the boy speak for the second time.
“Dance,” The boy repeats, and smiles equally wide. His voice is high-pitched and so beautiful Taehyung can almost hear angels singing in the background as the boy’s echoes. Taehyung’s future seems a thousand times brighter with the boy’s voice. He forces himself to look away from the boy’s hair, which, for some reason, has turned to dark purple-blue.
Does the boy use some hair-dying spell? But Taehyung doesn’t know any spell that can change hair color that quickly.
Metamorphmagus, Taehyung’s mind reminds him helpfully. People who were born with an incredibly rare ability to change their appearances however they like.
The boy must’ve noticed him staring, because he pats his head, his smile disappearing immediately when he realizes that his beanie has fallen off. The boy scrambles to pick up the fallen beanie and tries to put it back on, avoiding Taehyung’s gaze like they’re back to square one.
Before he can put on the beanie, though, Taehyung grabs the boy’s wrist gently, stopping him from proceeding. The boy freezes, his entire body becoming rigid.
“You look absolutely beautiful,” Taehyung mutters, his lips only a few centimeters away from the boy’s ear. He doesn’t even notice how fast he was moving. “Why are you hiding it?”
Taehyung takes the boy’s phone with his free hand and types down “you are absolutely beautiful” into the left bar of Google Translate. A sentence of another language appears on the right bar, and he shows the phone to the boy. He notices that the translating language is French.
The boy widens his eyes after reading the sentence. His gaze moves slowly back to Taehyung, and that beautiful smile returns. Taehyung releases a breath he doesn’t know he’s holding and allows his shoulders to slump and relax. All is well.
But then Taehyung’s breath hitches when he sees the Ravenclaw boy standing on his tiptoes and brushing his lips against Taehyung’s right cheek, then left. Those kisses are planted firmly to his cheeks, and for a few seconds Taehyung can feel the warmth of the boy’s plump lips and the pulsing of the boy’s veins.
It’s Taehyung’s turn to freeze.
“TaeTae,” The boy points at Taehyung. “Jimin.” The boy points back at himself.
And the boy leaves just like that, only stopping to grab his backpack and books before skipping out of the library, humming to the melody of A Night Full of Stars.
Jimin.
“Say what?” Yoongi finally looks up from his notebook, which he fills with lyrics and notes.
Taehyung clears his throat. “Like I just said, I have some lyrics I can contribute to that new song. Black Swan?” He phrases it like a question. He knows it’s a little out of character of him to help with lyrics, but he’ll probably go insane if this little part doesn’t end up in the song.
Yoongi wordlessly reaches out a hand, and Taehyung quickly puts a piece of scratch paper into the older boy’s hand.
Yoongi immediately frowns. “You write lyrics on the back of an expired coupon? With a pink highlighter?” He questions in disbelief.
Taehyung gives him a one-shoulder shrug. “The idea came suddenly and I had to grab whatever’s the closest.”
Yoongi huffs and turns his gaze back to the lyrics. He mouths it quietly and reads it over and over while frowning slightly. Taehyung shifts his legs and fidgets with his fingers as he waits. There’s always something about Yoongi that makes Taehyung a little nervous whenever they’re working on important things, like music.
“이게 나를 더 못 울린다면, 내 가슴을 더 떨리게 못 한다면, 어쩜 이렇게 한 본 죽겠지 아마, but what if the moment’s right now, right now.” Yoongi mutters under his breath. “If this can no longer resonate, no longer make my heart vibrate, then like this may be how I die my first death, but what if the moment’s right now, right now. ”
“Yeah.” Taehyung fidgets some more. “Is it bad?”
“No,” Yoongi says, turning back to Taehyung and squinting at him. “Not bad at all. In fact, they’re good. Really good. Way above your league, that’s certain. Did you write it or was it actually Hoseok-ah?”
“It was me.” Taehyung scratches the back of his head. “Why do you look so surprised? I’m good at writing lyrics too.”
Yoongi eyes him suspiciously. “No shit, Sherlock,” he says, sarcasm dripping freely from his words. He probably doesn’t mean a word he says, but Taehyung’s still kind of happy Yoongi didn’t reject him the first few seconds. Yoongi can be a very warm and fuzzy person with him but never when he’s at work.
“How do you know Sherlock? It’s a Muggle story.” Taehyung raises an eyebrow. “And you suck at Muggle Studies.”
“You obviously don’t pay attention at History of Magic,” Yoongi retorts sharply. “Because Sherlock Holmes is obviously a wizard. An alumnus at Hogwarts, in fact. A Ravenclaw and a Head Boy.”
“I . . . didn’t know that.” Taehyung shrugs again. “So will you add my lyrics to the song?”
“Yes,” Yoongi says slowly, staring at Taehyung with those creepily beautiful pale eyes. “What inspired you to write these things? You don’t look like you just had the idea of writing about first deaths and things like that.”
“It was Jimin, actually.” Taehyung thinks back to a few months ago when he first met the shy Ravenclaw boy. His hand comes to his cheek unconsciously, and he can almost feel the kiss planted there. He smiles dorkily. “He makes me feel deep things.”
“Stick with him, then.” Yoongi turns back to his notebook and tapes Taehyung’s coupon to a blank page. “Wouldn’t want you to sound stupid again, would we?”
“Hyung!!”