Arthur's thoughts drifted again as he paged through his lesson notes Monday morning. The thing was, he mused, he was pretty sure no one on this planet loved him the way Mal did. They'd bonded in the Ilvermorny dining hall on Mal's first day over their obsession with tri-taters and had been inseparable ever since.

Malorie Miles had always been skilled at Legilimency, but it wasn't until she was expelled during her second year at Beauxbatons that it became apparent how naturally it came to her. She had progressed exponentially on her own, with only books and word of mouth to guide her. Unfortunately, Legilimency isn't something 12-year-olds are generally capable of handling in a mature way, especially without some kind of direction.

The full-scale investigation Mal caused wasn't entirely her fault. The Legilimency she had performed on her Charms professor wasn't specific or even intentional, but she didn't know what to do except report the homicidal images she'd seen in her professor's head to the authorities. It turned out that the middle-aged, perfectly professional witch she'd accused was not planning on murdering her students. She was just a stressed-out teacher. But that didn't stop the widespread panic and discreditation that followed. So when Mal transferred to Ilvermorny, she came with a bit of a reputation.

Arthur was a quiet loner, and it seemed almost inevitable that he be sucked into the tornado that was Mal. She was eccentric, foreign, interesting, and just a little bit dangerous, and Arthur was hooked. If he'd had a heterosexual bone in his body, he'd have fallen for her head-over-heels like the rest of his class. Instead, he stood next to her in line at the cafeteria and made dry, cutting comments about their Muggle Studies professor to make her laugh.

He took it upon himself to call her out when she was being disproportionately passionate about something. "Mal, you're being a bitch and everyone can tell." He told her when she was talking too loud, which was most of the time. "Would you like a megaphone? Because that's the only way you could get louder." And he held her hand when she couldn't control how she was. "Mal, this isn't your fault. Just because he didn't want to hear it doesn't mean it isn't true."

Arthur wasn't remarkable, he'd known that for a long time. He was a hard worker, and an adept planner, but Mal. Mal was remarkable. She quickly became a legend in the field of Legilimency, and when they graduated, they both put in their applications at the Ministry to become Aurors. They would stop criminals, right wrongs, and bring justice to the world, partners forever.

Except they never became partners. They were both hired by the US Ministry, but Arthur shouldn't have been surprised when Mal was placed on a special task force and he was shoved behind a desk. And Mal was partnered with Dominic Cobb. It was a fierce, frantic, and frankly slightly disgusting courtship that Arthur had to hear far too much about, but Mal was sunk for him, and Arthur used every professional resource he had to determine if Dom was anywhere near worthy of his Mal. He wasn't, but neither was he a bad guy, so Arthur shook Dom's hand and joined him on the couch to watch Quidditch. And one night when they got drunk and Arthur blurted out his boyfriend had dumped him, Cobb collapsed with relief and then laughed himself silly. Arthur didn't think it was all that funny, but after that, Dom seemed to adopt a "big brother" role around him, and Arthur let him because he didn't know what else to do.

Eames's voice interrupted his thoughts as he strolled into Arthur's classroom. "I think you have another student with a crush on you," he quipped.

The erasers paused in wiping the last lesson off the chalkboard as Eames entered, but otherwise Arthur gave no sign he knew Eames had spoken. Eames dropped into his usual seat in the first row and kicked his legs up on the desk, his wide salmon-colored robes fluttering around him. And salmon-colored, of course, meant colored like an actual salmon, glittering like scales whenever Eames shifted his bulk. He grinned at Arthur, waiting to be acknowledged.

Arthur flicked an eye up to him then back down to his notebook, the pages turning by themselves. "Oh yeah?" he asked without interest. "And who is that?"

Eames crossed his arms, smirking. "Tiny little second-year transfer named Ophelia Pith. Promise not to scare her too much, will you?"

"Humph," he grunted. "And what makes you think she has a crush?" Arthur couldn't meet Eames's eyes. He felt too raw right now after Mal's episode, and everything was too close to the surface. And the way Eames looked at him, he always felt like the Metamorphmagus could read everything he was thinking, no matter how skilled Arthur was at Occlumency.

"The way she stares moonily when you walk past, of course. But, I suppose I could be wrong. She could just appreciate good tailoring." Eames leered at him, eyeing him up and down exaggeratedly. Arthur fought not to run a hand down his bespoke robes. He knew he looked good today.

Arthur snorted. "No one appreciates good tailoring anymore." He looked pointedly at Eames's wide collars spread over the opening at his throat.

"Not true! I most certainly do." Eames returned Arthur's look.

"What do you want, Eames?" Arthur asked with a huff of annoyance that covered the butterflies Eames's attention gave him.

"I was hoping you could use your attractiveness and wiles to lure her to join my Quidditch team." Eames beamed at him. "Cobb has his eye on her for Gryffindor, and I'm hoping you can help me steal her. She apparently comes from a family of chasers and her first day on a broom she blew Robert away."

Arthur snapped his moleskin shut. "Yeah, I'm not going to do that."

"Have a heart, darling!"

"Yeah, I'm not going to do that either."

Eames laughed like Arthur was hilarious, and Arthur's heartbeat skidded at the sound. Eames flipped a red, flat disc with his thumb and transformed it while it was in midair. Arthur had always loved this trick, although he tried not to show it. Eames could create some beautiful things when he wanted to. His Transfiguration class was always a favourite among the students.

When Eames caught him staring, he transformed it into a shiny spinning top and sent it flying over. Arthur drew his wand without thinking and destroyed it efficiently in a small burst of blue smoke. Eames pouted dramatically, and Arthur, to his great annoyance, felt a flash of guilt.

"Don't you ever use your planning period?" Arthur asked, his irritation bordering on real now.

"Me? Of course I do. This just isn't it."

Arthur blinked, surprised out of his bad mood. "It's not?" He didn't have time to keep track of Eames schedule, never mind that he had last semester's memorized. That just sort of happened. It's not like he went out of his way to look it up.

"Nope. Fourth hour."

Arthur frowned. "You mean when you were taking a nap in the professor's lounge yesterday?"

"Ah. What you saw there was a highly advanced technique of transcribing notes internally, recording them in a mental register for easy recollection later."

"You were snoring."

Eames flapped his hand. "Misdirection. I am a master of it. But seriously, Arthur, this technique! It has done wonders for my lesson plans, you should try it sometime. I could teach you. Tell you what, come over tonight and we'll get started."

"Yet another thing I'm not going to do," Arthur said with a sigh. "Mr. Eames, I have two back-to-back seventh years coming up that I do actually need to prepare for."

"Say no more, I can take a hint."

Arthur rolled his eyes. "Sure you can." But his lips twitched as Eames left the room.

Later, Arthur used the Finneganet to look up the red disc Eames had been transfiguring. Muggles called it a poker chip. He hadn't thought of Eames as someone who had a large interest in Muggle artifacts, but he felt bad for destroying it without thought, especially since it turned out to be harder than he imagined to replace. In the end, Arthur paid the outrageous fee to Moribund's Wizarding Emporium to have a new one delivered by owl. Well, a used one. He wasn't rich.

The invention of the Finneganet had changed the course of study at Hogwarts, and indeed, the whole wizarding world. It was different than when he was in school, and teaching evolved with it. Its creator, Seamus Finnegan, had attempted to replicate the Muggles' shared resource, something they used for being social and looking at pictures of cats. Finnegan had reportedly been tired of being blown up by Muggle electronics, and made it an enchanted book. It had been flying off the shelves since its inception, and while there was still a restricted section at the library, most of the rest had been replaced with copies of the Finneganet. It made life a lot easier, for students as well as professors.

Arthur was walking across campus after his back-to-back sevenths to clear his head and enjoy the end of the season's warmth when he heard a high-pitched whoop of victory. He caught sight of a small figure astride a broomstick, high over the Quidditch pitch completing consecutive loop de loops at breakneck speed. Arthur wandered over.

He stopped alongside Robert, whose long neck was tilted back as far as it would go, watching the slight figure with a small smile on his lips. They both stood a moment, tracking her movements until she levelled out and landed among her peers.

"Arthur!" Robert exclaimed, clapping him on the shoulder. "What brings you by?"

Arthur indicated the girl currently being surrounded by the other students, her face flushed with excitement and a grin stretching from ear to ear. "Eames said she was good. At least, I assume that's her, Ophelia Pith? The transfer student?"

Robert's excited blue eyes danced. "Yes, that's her! Isn't she fantastic? Such precision, such grace… did you see her do the slalom?"

Arthur shook his head. Robert turned to the pitch, put his fingers in his mouth, and let loose a shrill whistle. He motioned to the girl to go again and she nodded, her face breaking into another smile. Robert used his wand to throw giant pillars of coloured smoke into the air above the pitch and they both watched as she navigated the maze at high speed, turning corners like she'd been doing it since birth.

Arthur's eyebrows rose. "Wow. Eames was right. I am impressed."

"Your condescension, as always, is much appreciated, Arthur," came the warm drawl behind him. "Thank you."

Arthur turned to see Eames walking towards him, his robes billowing in the breeze and showing off the awful trousers he insisted on wearing. How someone could look so good while looking so bad was beyond Arthur. His crooked teeth were on display as he grinned at Arthur, and Arthur caught himself before he could lick his lips.

"Eames," he muttered at the ground in greeting.

"Eames!" Robert cried. "Did you see?"

"I did indeed, Robert," Eames said. "Gryffindor's still got a full roster, right? Any word yet on who she'll be trying out with?"

Robert's boyish grin faded and he shrugged. "She, ah, she said she's not sure she's interested."

Eames blinked in surprise. "Not interested?!" he exclaimed. "But tryouts are next week!"

Arthur tapped his Moleskin against his thigh and took a discreet step back.

Robert shrugged again. "Can't make her want to play Quidditch, Eames. She said she just likes flying."

"But Quidditch is flying!" Eames bellowed, and Arthur slid further back. "Doesn't she like Quidditch? Isn't she a witch? How can she not be interested!?"

When he was sure neither of them would notice, Arthur turned and started the walk back to the castle, the sound of Eames's braying following him up the path. Arthur shook his head, picturing Eames throwing his arms in the air and shouting out lists of chasers through the years and where would we be if so-and-so had decided they weren't interested?

"What are you smiling about?"

Arthur snapped his head up to see Yusuf smirking at him, one eyebrow raised quizzically.

"I'm… not," Arthur said, feeling far too warm, suddenly.

Yusuf's other eyebrow quirked up. "Uh huh," he said. "Where are you headed? Could you help me in the lab for a moment?" He turned and headed to the stairs without waiting for Arthur's reply.

"Ah, yeah, sure," Arthur answered and followed Yusuf to the potions lab to lend a hand.

The next time he saw Eames was during his planning period. Arthur tried to grumble to himself that he never seemed to get any actual planning done whenever Eames was around, but then Eames stretched and put his wide chest on display, and Arthur lost his train of thought.

"So, I see you've still got my future chaser gazing at you wistfully," Eames remarked. "How do you manage to get anything accomplished Arthur? You must have to beat them off with a stick."

Arthur snorted. "You should talk," he said, even though he knew he shouldn't be encouraging this line of conversation. "Didn't you have the girl with the literal hearts in her eyes?"

Eames chuckled. "Ah, yes. You have to admit, it was a pretty clever spell. Stupid, she had to go to the infirmary to get her pupils changed back, but clever."

Arthur chuckled too but stopped when he noticed Eames staring at him.

The silence stretched a beat too long before Eames said with a rush, "I've stopped by to see how wooing young Ophelia to my cause was going."

"I've never wooed anything in my life," Arthur said dryly.

"You shock me to my core, Arthur. Then how did you get the talented Mal Cobb to follow you here?"

Arthur let a small, wistful smile steal over his face. "I followed her, actually."

Eames watched him carefully, quiet for once. Arthur just pushed his robes aside to place his hands in his pockets, an indulgent and slightly pained smile on his face, adding, "We graduated from Ilvermorny together."

"Ah, what was she like, then? Before?"

Arthur's smile changed, fond and soft, almost a dimple smile. "She was lovely."

It was quiet, both men lost in their thoughts. Then the bell rang, breaking the moment.

"Well," Eames said rising to his feet. "I'd better let you get to those seventh years."

Arthur nodded, hands still in his pockets, and watched him walk out.