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The stars lived and died mere feet above Rhys’ head. He could watch them wink in and out of existence, the display pulling them through the current of time, of unimaginable number of years wheeling past in seconds. All of it representing months of work; it was the crown jewel of Rhys’ current portfolio. He loved to watch the skies turn inside the Augur dome, loved the fierce surge of pride and satisfaction it gave him every time.

But he could not bring himself to look away from the man standing across from him. Rhys could track the stars flaring and dying like glow bugs at the end of summer in the shine of his eyes.

Timothy Lawrence. Rhys had always thought of him as the one who’d got away, but that was dishonest, even to himself. Tim never went anywhere, because he was never in Rhys’ grasp. Not until just now.

Tim smiled. “Huh,” he said, quietly. He could not bring himself to look away from Rhys either, it seemed. “It’s so weird to think, isn’t it? What would’ve happened if I’d gone into a different Starbucks today? If I’d even come in five minutes earlier, or later…” He dropped his gaze, down to where he held Rhys’ hand with both of his. He rubbed his thumb across Rhys’ knuckles.

“Tell me something, Rhys.” He looked up, and Rhys saw a white giant in the black spread of his right eye. “Do you believe in destiny?”

Time was elastic. Humans treat it the way they treat any resource: irresponsibly, with no consideration for long-term consequences. Rhys thought about the nature of time a lot, thought about it during the long, long hours he spent in his design firm’s venture laboratory. That time spent wedged in a desk, elbow to elbow with the others at the firm, with blueprints spread over his work area and projected above his head in lines that twitched and reset every time someone new made a change. Echoes of old designs hung higher than that, twisting like mobiles in a baby’s room. That time felt like an aeon, five minutes passed like fifty years.

The time it took him to get from his arrival first thing in the morning to his lunch could’ve been measured in light years. Getting to the end of the day was like travelling from the asteroid belt to Pluto. Only Rhys didn’t have the fortune to be placed into a cryofreeze (or whatever people would do when they started traveling through space).

Meanwhile, lunch passed in a snap. The amount of time it took to blink. Shorter, if Rhys left the office and tried to enjoy the sunshine.

Time was elastic, and little things could send Rhys reeling backwards through his own personal stream of years. It wouldn’t take much more than the smell of burnt toast, which would always remind him—just for the space between breaths—of his grandmother’s kitchen. Nothing more than that—just the memory of being small and young and sitting at his grandmother’s breakfast table, with the sunlight streaming in through the bay windows, the bubbling sound of coffee brewing in her old fashioned percolator, and the smell of Wonderbread left for too long in her shiny chrome toaster. And it happened every single time.

Other things could set him off. Scent was a big trigger, but other senses could send him zipping back into his history. The ding-dong-dang chime that played before the subway doors opened and closed brought him back to his first year in the city, and set off a chain reaction of remembering buying a slice of pizza for a dollar outside the ticket booth during a charity drive, falling asleep and missing his stop, lurching off at the wrong stop to throw up on the subway platform, standing in a halted train, waiting for the lights to come back on.

The sticky feeling of a formica table could bring him back to his childhood home. The taste of Corn Pops could bring him back to sitting on his couch on Saturday morning, watching Pepper Ann and Recess.

The flutter of wings, the scent of candles burning, the feel of polished wood under his hands…

If Rhys’ life was a pie chart he’d slice it into two pieces: Hogwarts, and everything else. The Hogwarts part should’ve been small, and getting smaller as he spent more time he couldn’t afford to lose, but it never felt like that in his head. It felt like a dream, like seven years he’d spent in a coma, or in prison. A place so far removed from what his life had been and what it resumed being once he emerged the other side that the memories barely felt like his own.

Seven years wearing a robe, living in the freezing dungeon of a castle, under a huge lake with an actual monster in it. Seven years muttering Latin spells, eating in a great hall, learning history from a ghost. And the ghosts! Did he really spend seven years of his life fleeing from a poltergeist between classes? Watching a man’s head flop over onto his shoulder? Was that ever real? Was any of it?

It must’ve been. Anything could send Rhys back down memory lane, to visit the half-collapsed castle with a great hall that opened to the sky, to staircases that moved on a whim, to the waving branches of a willow tree that would—and sometimes did—try to kill any students that got close.

Rhys still practiced magic, of course. His job at Alter’s Architecture firm demanded he and the others like him use their wands as well as their wits, but it didn’t feel like the same thing, somehow. Rhys still muttered Lumos when he needed a quick light, but he would just as often reach for his iPhone as he would for his wand.

After he left the UK, moved to the States, he felt as if he’d wandered into a new world. Witches and wizards (or, as the PC-friendlier term preferred, magicians) didn’t sequester themselves into villages; they lived in the same suburbs or apartment buildings as their mundie friends.

There were still laws for their kind, and thus still law enforcement, but it lacked the all-seeing government oversight Rhys had been subjected to in England. When the magicians built themselves offices, they didn’t bury them in secret pathways and caves. Instead, they built them in the centre of the town, stacked on top of the pre-existing skyscrapers, accessible through special elevators. Rhys’ office was like that, and his job was to help design more of the same.

Nobody wore robes. Rhys didn’t even own a bathrobe.

Here’s a question that would bring anyone screaming back in time: what was the worst moment of your life?

Would you believe someone asked Rhys that very same question on a date? A first date, too, which was either extremely bold of them, or extremely stupid. Or both, why not.

Rhys should’ve plucked the linen napkin from his lap, tossed it onto the table, along with a few bills to cover his portion of the meal, and walked out of the cute little dim sum joint with his head held high and one less contact in his phone. For a split second, Rhys could see it happen as if he were gazing through a keyhole into his own future.

But the person who’d asked him wasn’t the sort of person Rhys ever wanted to walk away from. Not when they’d just found each other again. So instead of making a dignified exit, Rhys chewed the last of his xiao long bao, swallowed, and stretched his lips into an almost-smile.

“That’s kind of a terrible thing to ask on a first date,” he said.

“Oh, we’re dating?” Tim tapped his chopsticks against his plate just before reaching over to one of the steam baskets for a wedge of turnip cake. “I’m glad you told me. I’ve spent the last twenty minutes trying to figure out if I should put my hand on your knee or not.” He popped the food into his mouth and reached for his glass of white, and didn’t put his hands on Rhys.

“That would be a much better first date move,” Rhys said, edging himself slightly closer to Tim’s side of the table.

Tim shook his head. “Nah, now you’re expecting it. I’ll have to come up with something else.”

“I can pretend to be surprised,” Rhys said, nudging himself closer.

Tim gave him a quick, lopsided smile. One cheek bulged with a mushroom and leek dumpling. He tapped his chopsticks again, and Rhys wondered for the first time if Tim was actually nervous.

The tips of Rhys’ fingers tingled. He pressed his hands against his thighs and tried to control his breathing. The thought that he could make Tim even a little nervous felt better than throwing any spell he could think of. Made him feel like he was flying. He tried not to look too giddy.

“So, how come you’re dodging my question?” Tim asked, reaching for the seafood pancake. Rhys held the point of his chopstick in the fried dough, letting Tim more easily pull a chunk free.

“It’s a bad question,” Rhys said. “Why would I want to ruin the mood thinking about the worst moment of my life? We’re having such a nice time.”

“Are we?” Tim’s cheeks turned pink and he looked so pleased.

Rhys thought about closing the distance between them and giving him a kiss. Tim’s gaze flicked over to the front windows. He pursed his lips and fiddled with his chopsticks. Rhys swayed forward.

“Back when I was in university, I went on a first date at a café with someone I’d been crushing on for weeks. They asked me about the worst moment of my life. It caught me off-guard, but I told them and afterwards I felt a little more connected to them. We dated for a few years after that.” He licked his lips and looked a little bashful and it was only because he looked good enough to eat that kept Rhys from walking out.

Rhys sat back, frowning. “I’m going to ignore the fact that you brought up an ex during a first date, which is a huge faux pas by the way,” he said. Tim winced and plucked another wedge of turnip cake from the plate.

“Sorry,” he said as he dunked it in the soy sauce. “I warned you that it’s been a while.”

Rhys almost hated that he still found Tim so charming. He was always a handsome boy, but he’d gotten even better looking as he got older. The whisper of grey at his temples gave him character. Rhys even liked that he didn’t try to dye it.

“I asked you about it,” Tim said as he dabbed at his mouth with his napkin, “because the last time I heard that question in a first date, it lead to one of the longest relationships I’d ever had.” He smiled crookedly. “I guess I was hoping lightning might strike twice.”

The tingling in Rhys’ fingers spread through him, running like a harmless charge of electricity. His face went hot. Rhys really thought that if he’d had his wand in his hand, sparks would’ve started flying.

He reached for his glass and washed the moment away with a gulp of white wine. If the way Tim’s smile curved into something a little less goofy and a little more heated was any indication, Rhys had failed to hide his reaction.

“That was clumsy,” Rhys said, pulling himself together.

“You thought it was charming,” Tim said. Rhys ate another bao instead of replying. “You can take your time, if you need it. But I would like to hear. If it’s not too traumatic, or too upsetting. I mean, my worst moment keeps changing,” he went on as he pulled the basket closer to this plate. “I think my latest worst moment was when I ordered Indian food for myself and the delivery included four plastic forks.” His mouth twisted. “I thought three curries and an order of pakoras was reasonable for one person.”

Rhys hid his smile in another bite of seafood pancake. He chewed and gave Tim’s question some consideration.

Art by Scootsaboot

Rhys was eleven the first time he met Timothy Lawrence.

Alright, maybe ‘met’ was a bit of a strong verb for what happened. Rhys stood with a group of trembling children at the front of a hall, standing in stunned silence while a hat sang about British school housing system (was it always this colourful? Did all British schools sort based on personality?). But memory was a funny thing, and although Rhys knew that, logically, he could not have seen Tim for more than a second, he could somehow picture him clearly whenever he thought back on that night. He could picture Tim seated at a long table, among students clad in yellow and black. It didn’t make sense that Rhys could see him so clearly. That, in Rhys’ memory, in the second before the hat slipped over his eyes, he saw Tim watching him.

Ridiculous. Tim was just one of hundreds. At the time, Rhys couldn’t have picked him out of a line-up of two.

And for some reason, Tim wasn’t a child in Rhys’ memory, even though he couldn’t have been older than 12 or 13 at the time. Rhys always remembered him the way his hormonally fevered brain saw him a few years later, like one of those 20-year-old actors who play teenagers in television shows. He pictured him as tall (but not quite as tall as Rhys), broad in the shoulders and narrow in the hips, with clear, glowing skin, floppy chestnut coloured hair, a lantern jaw and chiselled features. Even though Tim had a twin brother, he was always the most handsome person Rhys had ever laid eyes on.

The sound of cheering and feet stomping on wooden stands would always bring Rhys back to Hogwarts. To the rickety stands encircling the quidditch pitch, where he sat, sandwiched between whichever of his friends he could convince to join him (Fiona, usually, because she liked to watch the Ravenclaw seeker). He must’ve gone to over a hundred games over the course of seven years, and he could count on one hand the number of times the weather was remotely decent. It was always cold, almost always raining, and despite being a school filled with literal magic users, no one ever bothered to build an enclosure to keep the wet out. No one had ever built one before, so why should they break tradition and start now? Hogwarts was that kind of place.

Rhys would sit on an uncomfortable bench seat, with his chin buried in his scarf, his nose turning red and starting to drip, and his ice cold hands wedged between his thighs, and he would watch owlishly while teenagers whizzed through the air almost a dozen feet above his head. Seven years he spent losing the feeling in his extremities, in the rain or in the very rare shine, all because he wanted to see the Hufflepuff team play. Because he liked watching their beater swing his bat.

God, Tim was so good. Even after seven years, Rhys didn’t have much knowledge of quidditch, but he knew talent. Tim didn’t have the same bulk you might otherwise find on other teams, but he was strong enough to knock a bludger across the field, and nimble enough to avoid any return fire. Most of the time.

Rhys’ neck would ache from the amount of time he’d spent staring up at the sky, watching Tim move.

The best part came after the game had finished, when the players would disembark on the field and usually start stripping out of their uniform robes. Rhys could remember Tim just like that, with his face wet and red and his hair plastered down on his forehead, sweat and (usually) rain beading on his forehead. He could remember quite clearly that Tim had a habit of pulling at his collar, knocking his shirt against his chest in an attempt to generate airflow. Smiling at his teammates, eyes glittering. Looking happy, even if he lost.

The worst moment of Rhys’ life happened just after a quidditch match.

The hiss of steam from an espresso machine will always make Rhys think about his university days. The small Second Cup on campus, run by a rotating staff of students who would work for a week or two, get fed up with the poor management and poorer treatment by their peers, quit and then become quickly replaced (Rhys only lasted two weeks). It served some of the worst coffee Rhys had ever tasted, but he had fond memories of their iced hot chocolate and their brick-thick breakfast cookies.

Rhys didn’t step foot into Second Cup anymore. His preferred venue was a nice, upscale café in the ground level of a silver-mirrored skyscraper. The place was styled with brass and wood, made up to look like a slice of 1920s Parisian prosperity knocked like a stake into the heart of the financial district.

On a bright June morning, just as the breakfast rush hit its zenith, Rhys stood in a line that stretched nearly out the door, riding the pleasant post-first coffee and pre-second coffee fog, idly thinking over his daily tasks, when he heard his name spoken in a voice he hadn’t heard in more than ten years.

Actually, the voice said it a few times. Once quietly, second more firmly, and third only got through because it was accompanied by a light touch on his arm. When Rhys jolted back into the present world, he blinked hard and looked into the distressingly still very handsome face of his schoolboy crush.

Later, Tim will ask Rhys if he’d considered all the variables, all the things that had to go right in order for them to find each other again. That they would be in the same café, at the same time, on the same street in the same big city. That Tim would be out in this part of the city at all, so far from where he worked, that he even stopped off in a place that he knew he could barely afford, because he wanted to treat himself to a chocolate croissant. If it’d been any other day, if something had gone wrong, if Tim had been delayed, or Rhys had missed his train, or if a hundred thousand little things had been even slightly different…

“Rhys, I can’t believe it’s you. Do you remember me?” Tim smiled.

“Holy shit,” Rhys said.

The hat told Rhys he was ambitious and cunning, which was a hell of a thing to say to an eleven year old. Up until that point, Rhys hadn’t really considered himself to be either of those things. Sure, he wanted to be a popular, well-liked person in his school, but who didn’t? Did that really mark him for ambition? And as for cunning, well. Rhys was eleven. His most cunning schemes revolved around claiming a can of soup he’d dumped into the toilet was his vomit in order to con his way into spending the day home from school.

But then again, what sort of eleven year old is hard working? What sort of eleven year old could be considered brave? Hell, even intelligent was a stretch. At eleven years old, Rhys considered himself to be all of those things and more. He never once thought he was cunning.

Reflecting on it now, Rhys could barely think of eleven year olds as fully formed human beings. The children who ran around in his apartment complex seemed as far from civilized as supposed human could get. They were unmolded clay. Half-feral, hard-eyed, always running, always yelling…

Rhys wondered about it. Did a singing piece of clothing really peer into the inner workings of his mind, select his most prominent traits, and slot him into a house filled with like-minded individuals? Or had Rhys become cunning and ambitious over his stay in Hogwarts purely as a result of peer pressure?

Rhys spent almost the length of his commute thinking it over before he dismissed it as one of the many mysteries presented by the school of witchcraft and wizardry.

It would be silly to say that Rhys believed in magic. Before he attended Hogwarts, that might’ve been accurate—but after leaving the wizarding world behind, Rhys believed in magic in the same way he believed in his city’s transit system, or a hammer. It was a tool he used, not something to get all romantic about.

“I can’t believe this.” Tim looked at Rhys like he was something that’d stepped out of a good dream. A mixture of giddy pleasure and almost awe. “I can’t believe it’s really you. I haven’t seen anyone from—from our school since I left.”

They found a small round table by the door and crammed two rickety chairs around it. Tim hadn’t been small before and he’d filled out since then. Rhys’ gaze skated over Tim’s chest and shoulders for about the tenth time since they’d sat down.

Rhys was a little more compact, but even with his ankles tucked together under his chair, his knees knocked against the top of their table, sloshing his chocolate-dark espresso dangerously close to the rim of his little mug. Tim held his ice coffee with both hands and Rhys watched with fascination as the cold leeched into his arms, turning the skin to gooseflesh. A plate sat in the centre of the table, a raspberry chocolate muffin disassembled on top. The café was out of chocolate croissants.

“You have to get here before 7am for the croissants,” Rhys said, feeling almost apologetic.

Tim wrinkled his nose. “That doesn’t even sound worth it,” he said.

They talked. Rhys sent an email to his office, faking an emergency and informing them he’d be in a little later than usual.

Their little shared table meant they had to lean in close to talk. The café had started to clear out, but Tim didn’t pull away. Rhys smiled.

“A teacher,” he said. “An actual teacher. I never would’ve thought.”

Tim raised an eyebrow. “And why’s that?”

“Just… before, you weren’t exactly…” Rhys tossed his hand towards Tim’s chest, waved it at his shoulders, as if this would encompass what he was trying to diplomatically say.

Tim’s other eyebrow rose to join its twin. “Weren’t exactly… what? Patient? Kind?” he asked.

“You were kind,” Rhys said quickly. He’d never thought otherwise.

“Not all the time.” Now Tim was smiling.

“I always thought…” Rhys trailed off. Although he’d put ‘excellent communication skills’ on all of his resumes, it was as much of a fib as his ‘loves the hiking and the outdoors’ on his Tinder account. In truth, he’d thought a lot of things about Timothy Lawrence, but they weren’t the kind of things he knew how to put into words beyond ‘good body, soft lips, hair, nice’.

Tim swallowed a mouthful of coffee. He glanced out the window. “I know I was kind of… rowdy as a kid. I didn’t have a great upbringing before—before. You know. But that was years ago. People change. I like to think I have.”

Rhys ran his finger around the edge of his mug. He cleared his throat. “I never— never meant to imply—“

Tim cut him off with a smile. “I’m happier now. I look back at where I was and it doesn’t bother me so much.” He reached out and touched his fingers to the back of Rhys’ hand. “I like where I’ve gotten.”

Rhys’ skin tingled, and that floating feeling returned. Like he’d taken a flying leap off the lip of a building with his old broomstick tucked under him.

“Do you ever miss it?” Rhys asked, a little while later.

Tim licked crumbs from his fingers. “Which? The school of magic or the magic itself?”

“Either,” Rhys said.

Tim hummed as he stirred his straw through the half-melted ice and dregs of milky coffee. “I miss the stability of the school. I don’t know if I miss the magic, much. Did you know I was thinking about becoming an auror? When I left, I knew I had to make a choice. I could keep down the path of the wizarding world.” He waggled his fingers. “Or I could return to the world I grew up in and try to readjust. Although even doing that was a pain in the ass. The ministry really doesn’t like muggleborns reintegrating into their old lives. I had to fill out paperwork just so they could give me a proper GED, something I could use to apply to a real university.” He lowered his hand, his gaze sliding down. “The non-magical world wasn’t always my favourite place to be, but it was familiar at least. I missed wearing jeans.”

“Oh my god, tell me about it.” Rhys laughed. “Can you believe we spent prime iPod years in a place where basically no music was ever allowed?”

Tim huffed. “I’m still furious we were locked away in a luddite prison castle while ‘Mr. Brightside’ was ripping up the charts.”

“God.” Rhys dropped his head into his hands. “I would go home to my friends every summer and they’d have to catch me up on all the pop culture I’d missed. I don’t know what excuses I gave them. I think I told them the partial truth—that I was in a super, super remote castle in the highlands where there was no ISP.”

Tim chuckled bitterly. “Hey, who needs the greatest technological development of the last two thousand years when you can have a ghost blowing a raspberry above your head at three in the fucking morning?”

“Goddamn, I hated Peeves so much,” Rhys said.

“Everyone did.” Tim leaned his head onto his fist. “I mean, magic’s got its uses.” He waved his hand over his shoulder, a gesture Rhys assumed was meant to evoke the mufflato charm Rhys had dropped over their table before they began. “And for all the bullshit, I did make some good friends in my house. Gave me some stability. Getting three square meals on the regular did me a world of good. It’s crazy how much easier it is to focus on school and not be an angry piece of shit when you’re not hungry all the time.”

“I bet,” Rhys said, unsure of how else to reply.

Tim rubbed his mouth and sighed. “I miss the people, sometimes. That’s my one regret. I wish they had, like, Facebook or something. I guess I could owl them but… where the fuck am I supposed to find an owl?”

“The zoo?” Rhys suggested.

Tim snorted, eyes gleaming. “They’re probably not going to let me just take one of their owls for a spin.”

“I stuck with it,” Rhys said. He touched his fingers to the pocket of his cuffed chinos, feeling the outline of his wand and the lip of his phone. “I went to a regular university, got a degree in structural engineering, but I found a job that let me use mundie knowledge and the wand.” He tapped his thigh.

“‘Mundie’, huh. You really have gone native,” Tim said.

“I hate the term ‘nomaj’,” Rhys said with a sniff. Tim gave him another smile. It crinkled the lines around his eyes. Rhys forgot what he’d been saying and smiled back.

“So, you’re a magical architect?” Tim asked.

Growing up, Rhys had gone through the usual catalogue of potential future career goals that all kids went through. First he wanted to work at McDonalds (he’d naively believed he would get access to unlimited fries, being too young to understand how capitalism worked), then he wanted to be an astronaut, and then the prime minister (which would also give him unlimited fries, and possibly ice cream sandwiches?), and then a long distance runner (he had the legs for it!), and then a ballet dancer (a ballerino, thank you very much), and then a model, a prize fighter (this one lasted only a week, and it only came about because a classmate had stolen Rhys’ brownie), a rock star (sequins!), a classical musician (elegant tuxedoes!), etc. etc. He’d never once imagined he would become a wizard.

When he first arrived at Hogwarts, he adjusted his childish ambitions (along with a lot of his pre-conceived notions about what was possible in the world he thought he knew) and set his sights to more fantastical professions. Like any kid who’d heard about the Chosen One, Rhys had briefly wanted to be an auror. And then a quidditch player, which lasted about a month before he threw up over the ramparts during a flying lesson. Then he wanted to paint magical portraits. Then he wanted to categorize magical creatures in the wild. And then…

And then, around his fourth year, he began to realise that his job opportunities were kind of limited in the magical world. He had little desire to work in the government, and he’d outgrown his cops and robbers phase. He had zero desire to stay in Hogwarts and teach. Even if he did want that, it wasn’t as if there’d be a lot of opportunities. The last head of Gryffindor retired after close to 50 years in the position, for fuck’s sake. And she’s only retired because she’d gotten injured in the war.

Rhys didn’t even know he wanted to work in architecture until he was in his sophomore year of university, when he watched an Olympic stadium roof unfurl like a flower during the opening ceremonies in Tokyo. He had no idea if magic was actually involved in the creation of the stadium but he could imagine buildings just like it, sprouting across the landscape of muggle cities. Why did wizards have to hide underground? The sky really should’ve been the limit.

“Why did you give up on magic?” Rhys asked Tim as they finished their dinner.

Tim swirled the last of his wine and cast his gaze to the ceiling. “It’s not like I gave up,” he said, balling his paper napkin up and tossing it onto his plate. “I still have my wand.”

“Do you have it on you?” Rhys asked.

“Sure do.” Tim knocked his foot against his beat-up leather messenger bag. He looked into Rhys’ face and frowned. “What?”

“You don’t even keep it on you?” Rhys could hear his own horror and disbelief.

Tim made a dismissive noise and reached for the bottle. “It’s not like I need it. Anyway, have you ever spent any time at all with small children?”

Rhys’ expression twisted. Tim laughed and poured them both another measure of wine.

“Didn’t think so. They’re curious and grabby, and they’re not always the best at asking for permission first. I lasted about an hour into my first day teaching grade one before I smartened up and put the wand in my desk. The last thing I needed was an undiscovered muggleborn accidentally firing off a levitation spell or something,” Tim said.

“Why did you want to become a teacher?” Rhys asked.

Tim smiled at their server as she cleaned up their dishes and cleared away their empty baskets. He waited until she’d finished and walked away before speaking again.

“I told you I wanted to be an auror for, like, a hot second, right?” he asked. Rhys nodded. “Well, when I decided that wasn’t going to be the path for me, I gave some real consideration into what I wanted to do. I think the reason I even wanted to be an auror in the first place was because part of me kind of wanted to help people. But how do aurors help normal people? My childhood was miserable, and no auror was going to come along and save me from it. But I’ll tell you, the one thing that made it even a little tolerable were my teachers. Not all of them,” he allowed as he reached for his glass. “Some were dicks, but a lot of them were decent. My third grade teacher used to bring me and Jack granola bars from her home. Guess she noticed our lunches weren’t the most robust.”

Rhys fiddled with the thin stem of his glass. He knew a little about Tim’s childhood, but he was never sure how to handle the little anecdotes he’d toss out like breadcrumbs of sadness. He tried to take his cues from Tim.

“So, you wanted to make a difference,” Rhys said, lips tilting in a smile.

Tim hummed. “I suppose I did.” His cheeks had turned sweetly pink, and it might’ve been the wine, but Rhys liked to think it wasn’t.

“And you don’t miss…” Rhys waved his hand, his fingers clenched around an invisible wand. The gesture was just a little lewd—everything involving a long, thin length of wood was bound to be—and Tim’s cheeks turned pinker. He looked away, rubbing his mouth with his long fingers.

“I do sometimes, but it’s not a big deal. I can go entire days without using it and I barely even notice,” Tim said. “It’s not like I’m banned from magic, or had my—“ He mimed Rhys’ earlier movement. Rhys sputtered, face heating. Tim waggled his brows. “—snapped in half.”

Rhys’ nose wrinkled. “Oh, god,” he muttered, his fantasy crashing into an unpleasant image. “I should hope not.”

Tim snatched his glass in triumph. “I promise you, it’s in one piece.”

“Maybe I should check later,” Rhys said, the half-bottle of wine he’d consumed taking control of his tongue. Tim paused with the glass half-way to his lips.

“Well.” He smiled. “Maybe you should.”

The bill arrived, saving them both from embarrassing themselves further. There was some back-and-forth, but Rhys was able to wrestle it from Tim’s grasp.

“I invited you out. Therefore, I’m the guy who puts down the plastic at the end of the night,” Rhys said, slapping his silver card onto the table. “Besides,” he went on as Tim opened his mouth. “This way I can collect air miles.”

Tim shut it with a frown. “What if I want to collect air miles?”

“Then you can pick our next date,” Rhys said casually as their server handed him the machine. He tapped in his charge code and a generous tip, taking care to keep his expression neutral. He didn’t look up until the device spat out his receipt, and found Tim looking back at him with a smile.

“Sounds like a plan,” he said.

 The tingling feeling in Rhys’ hands returned, his innate magic ability sparking to life again. It reminded him of the first time he’d sipped butter beer—a warming, fizzy feeling that spread down his throat, to his hands from his chest, and then into his head. He could not remember the last time a person made him feel like that.

For some reason, the fact that Tim could go entire days without feeling like this, Without even the simple pleasure of casting a spell successfully, without feeling his own magic coming to life inside of him, made Rhys feel sad.

 “You okay?” Tim asked as he picked his coat from the back of his chair.

“Fine.” Rhys finished the last of his wine, slammed the glass back onto the table, and pushed his chair back. “How do you feel about staying out a little late? I’ve got something I’d like to show you.”

“Oh, I don’t know if I can stay out too long past curfew,” Tim said, the lines around his eyes crinkling again.

It was obnoxious, Rhys decided. It was too cute. Someone needed to kiss Tim, needed to press their lips against those wrinkles every time they appeared. He rocked forward on his feet, the wine making him brave and reckless, before he caught up with himself.

“Whoa.” Tim caught Rhys as he stumbled a half-step forward. “You okay?”

“I’m awesome,” Rhys said, righting himself. “And I’ve got something awesome to show you. C’mon.” He nudged Tim. “I promise it’ll be cool.”

“Really?” Tim’s smile grew sly. He slotted his arm through Rhys’. “You promise?”

Rhys’ chest swelled, a wave of tingling warmth swept through him. He felt certain he could’ve flown them there, had Tim only asked. He wouldn’t even need a broomstick. He could do anything.

He could take Tim’s hand, lean down and press a quick kiss on his temple. Tim blinked, and smiled wider.

“I promise,” Rhys said.

Rhys hadn’t forgotten Tim’s question, although he’d managed to dodge it. The worst moment of his life went like this:

The prefects had a special bathroom. It was supposed to be a secret, but anyone with two brain cells to rub together knew that secrets couldn’t be kept. The only way ten people could keep a secret was if nine of them died in a bus crash. Even then, the tenth would have to be in a coma.

Everyone knew about the prefects’ bathroom. Rhys knew about it by his second week, although he was maybe a little too young to understand the appeal of a large, mostly private, very lavish bath for hormonal teenagers. When he got older, and his peers began to talk about their steamy encounters in the prefects’ bathroom, Rhys began to wonder what kind of perverts had designed this castle. Were the middle ages really that horny? Life expectancy was much shorter back then. Maybe they felt they had less to lose.

Tim was a prefect. You can see where this is going.

It was Tim’s seventh year, and Rhys’ sixth. Tim had just finished quidditch practice, and Rhys knew from careful observation (not stalking!) that Tim preferred to skip the team showers in favour of a good, long soak in the prefects’ baths.

Rhys should have been a prefect, in his opinion. His grades were good, and he seldom got into trouble. The only reason he wasn’t (as he would tell anyone who’d listen) was because everyone knew that Professor Edwina was a purist bitch, who only let her family’s friends’ kids get the promotion. Bunch of inbred, pureblood jerks. Rhys might’ve been a muggleborn, but at least he had a chin.

It took a week’s worth of grovelling and a promise to buy the first round during every visit to Hogsmede from then ‘til the end of their seventh year, before Vaughn (Gryffindor prefect) would give him the password.

“I’m only doing it because you desperately need to get laid,” Vaughn said.

“For real,” Yvette said. “Watching you chase that beefsteak around was cute at first but now I’m just sad for you.”

“You’re the best friend in the world,” Rhys said, ignoring her.

“I am,” Vaughn agreed solemnly. He reached up and clapped Rhys on the shoulder. “Now, please do us all a favour and fuck that Hufflepuff.”

Rhys intended to do just that. He gathered his supplies and created a plan. Based on his previous observations (still not stalking!), it would take Tim ten minutes to make his way from the pitch to the baths. Rhys would wait fifteen minutes from the end of the practice to find Tim, already stripped out of his kit, fully sweaty and ready to slip into the tub. Rhys would say something coy and clever and join him.

Hang on. He’d strip first and then join Tim in the water. He would show Tim the bottle of coconut rum he’d managed to smuggle in (bought from a muggle liquor store and stored in Rhys’ suitcase just for this exact purpose) and offer him a drink. Tim was a muggleborn like Rhys, and no doubt he missed the flavour of alcohol that tasted the way sunscreen smelled. Of course he would agree.

They would drink. Rhys would drum up some scintillating conversation. Seduction would be imminent. The plan became loose after that, but Rhys figured he could improvise from there.

Rhys wasn’t exactly a virgin, although he wasn’t entirely experienced either. Especially not with men. Videos on the internet had filled in the gaps of his knowledge.

It began promisingly enough. Rhys lingered by the back of the stands and watched as the team dismounted onto the pitch, put away their equipment, and make for the showers.

Tim lingered a little behind the others, his head bent towards his fellow beater, a fifth year named McCabe, as they walked side-by-side off the green. Rhys rocked a little on the tips of his toes, glancing at his watch as they wanted. He wished, for about the fiftieth time that day, that he had a cellphone. Finally, he saw Tim leave the team showers and make his way towards the castle.

Rhys counted the minutes as he followed, taking care to stay several yards behind Tim. When he jogged up the stairs, Rhys stopped and waited until the doors breathed open and shut, and followed at a more reasonable pace.

Rhys took his time. He glanced at his watch every half minute, jiggled his knee, and waited for the minute hand to hit five past the hour. The fifth floor corridor was deserted, which was an excellent sign. Rhys stood beside the statue of Boris the Bewildered and watched the minute hand tremble its way past the number five.

He sucked in a deep, calming breath. And then he did it again. Rhys was ready. He told himself he was ready.

Rhys spoke the password and Boris stepped aside. Steam billowed out from the open passage, curling around the cold flagstones. Rhys’ chest felt like a box of birds. He flexed his fingers, tried another deep breath, and walked inside.

Things went south almost immediately.

It started the second he heard, above the quiet splash of water, the sound of voices echoing off the stones as if they were speaking from the heart of a deep cave.

Voices. Plural. Rhys’ spine turned to ice. He recognized Tim’s voice almost immediately, but the second was a girl’s.

He should turn around. His heart pounded through his body, the vibration going all the way up to his skull. He should walk out of there before they saw him. He slipped his hand into his pockets and gripped the neck of his bottle.

But… the thought of tossing his plans out the window after spending so many weeks working towards this moment felt like a massive betrayal. He imagined himself as an old man, recounting to his grandchildren; the time he walked into the prefects’ baths to nail a hot upperclassmen only to turn around because of what? Because there was someone else there? Rhys hesitated.

Maybe this could still be salvaged. He could still seduce Tim. He just had to figure out a way to get the other person out of there. His fingers relaxed around the bottle and slipped down to his wand. He crept through the steam like a swamp monster through the fog. He could just make out the shape of two people—Tim’s body was immediately obvious, and the thought that he was naked and soaking wet made Rhys’ palms sweat—in the sunken baths. The girl was seated on the lip of the tub, with her hair wrapped up in a towel. Rhys did some quick mental calculation, running through the list of spells he could use.

Please understand that Rhys was sixteen years old and extremely horny. His every thought had to travel through a miasma of hormones designed to impair cut his logic off at the knees.

He landed on transfiguration. He was good at transfiguration, and it wouldn’t be painful. Rhys locked his gaze on the hazy form of the strange girl’s towel wrap, raised his wand, and crept forward.

Two things happened. The first, and least terrible, was Rhys slipping in a pool of water. His right foot slipped out from under him and his left slid to the side and he fell hard to the floor. He knocked his chin against the flagstones hard.

The second and more terrible thing was that Rhys was actually able to cast the spell as he fell. Instead of hitting the girl’s wrapped head, it went wide and slammed into the faucet, which burst into a flock of butterflies in a spray of water. The now-broken faucet spewed water while a cloud of blue-winged butterflies scrambled towards the ceiling.

Rhys didn’t notice this immediately. He lay on his belly for a stunned moment, blinking stars from his eyes. He heard shouting, splashing, feet padding on the cold stones, and saw a flash of light. The steam cleared in an instant.

Tim stood in front of him, face gone the colour of paste under his brown freckles. He was in a towel, Rhys was disappointed to see.

“Holy shit,” Tim said as Rhys pushed his arms under him. “Are you okay?”

Tim dropped to a knee in front of Rhys, and maybe the universe had taken pity on him, because it parted the short towel just right, giving Rhys a peek. Rhys took his time getting up.

“There’s butterflies!” the girl shouted. “Up in the dome! We broke the bloody faucet!”

“You’re bleeding,” Tim said. Perhaps misinterpreting Rhys’ reluctance to move as weakness, Tim slipped his hands under Rhys’ pits and pulled him to his feet.

“Hi,” Rhys said, staring into Tim’s face.

“Why would there be butterflies!” she shouted.

“I’m not kidding, there’s a lot of blood coming out of your mouth.” Tim peered at Rhys. He touched his fingers gently to Rhys’ jaw. “See?” He pulled them back and showed Rhys the red tips.

“Huh,” Rhys said, squinting at Tim’s hand like it held secrets just for him. His head felt like a church bell at noon.

“What are we supposed to do about the faucet?” the girl demanded.

“Fix it,” Tim snapped. “He needs to go to Madam Wick. You need to go to the infirmary,” he added more gently to Rhys.

“Okay.” Was it his imagination, or did his lip feel fat and numb? His mouth tasted like salt and pennies. Still, he made his eyes round and wet and aimed them right at Tim. “You’ll have to take me,” he said. An opportunistic Slytherin to his core.

“Okay, fine,” Tim said. Rhys wondered if he was angry. He looked angry. There was a line between his brows and his lips were pulled into a frown. But he kept his voice even and soft when he spoke to Rhys. Rhys decided that if Tim was mad, it was still salvageable. He could still make this work.

Tim grabbed his robes from the hook on the wall and dressed in a hurry, to Rhys’ disappointment. At least without the steam clouding things, Rhys got a good look at Tim’s back, legs, and his ass. Silver lining.

(In Rhys’ memories, Tim looked like a sculpture of a Greek god. In reality, Tim had looked like any moderately athletic 17 year old boy. Regardless, Rhys always remembered Tim’s freckles accurately.)

Tim lead Rhys into the hall. The cool air hit Rhys like a wet blanket falling from the ceiling. It’d gotten late in the day, and the golden light of sunset streamed in through the narrow windows.

Rhys’ face felt wet. He sniffed and rubbed his chin with his sleeve—and immediately regretted it when pain sliced across his jaw like a knife. He dropped his arm with a hiss. Tim looked back and winced when he saw what Rhys had been doing.

“Careful.” He fell back into step with Rhys. “I think you bit your lip open.”

“Oh,” Rhys said. The shock of pain left him feeling dizzy, disconnected. Without thinking, he pressed his tongue against his lower lip and hissed again.

Tim huffed and wrapped his arm around Rhys’ waist, pulling him along despite the fact that Rhys had been walking perfectly fine under his own power. Still, Rhys wasn’t about to complain. He leaned into Tim.

“Stop touching it,” Tim said.

“My name’s Rhys,” Rhys said. Maybe slurred a little.

Tim huffed again. It might’ve been a laugh. “I know who you are.”

“Really?” Rhys leaned further onto Tim, knocking them a little out of step. Tim grunted under the new weight but corrected their course quickly. “How? I’m not in your year.”

“I’ve got eyes,” Tim muttered. He still looked a little angry. “What were you doing in the prefects’ lavatory? Who gave you the password?”

“I can’t tell you that,” Rhys said. “I can’t give up someone like that.”

“So it’s not your short Gryffindor boyfriend?” Tim asked.

Rhys frowned and winced when it pulled at his wound. “Vaughn’s not my boyfriend,” he said. Tim looked away. He might’ve said something else, but he spoke too quietly to be heard. Rhys leaned into him again, just to feel Tim supporting his weight. “I don’t have a boyfriend. Orrrr a girlfriend.” Yes, Rhys was definitely slurring. He sounded drunk. “I’m single. And you’re cute.” He was lisping too, that was just perfect.

Tim turned red. “You have a concussion.”

That was probably true, but Rhys didn’t want to acknowledge it. “I bit my lip off,” he said.

“You didn’t bite it off. You just… bit through it,” Tim said.

Rhys moaned pathetically and draped himself over Tim’s shoulders. He pushed his head into Tim’s neck, knocking them off-course. “It’s terrible,” he said. “I’ll have a scar. Who will want me now?”

Tim might’ve been laughing again. “You won’t get a scar. Madam Wick’ll set you right.” He tapped his fingers against the back of Rhys’ neck. “Get up, you’re slowing us down.”

Rhys would later blame what happened next on the concussion, on the anxiety that still twanged his nerves like guitar strings, on the adrenaline his body pumped through his brain, adding another chemical to the potent cocktail that already saturated Rhys’ higher functions like a poison.  

Tim looked over, and Rhys’ breath caught. There was nothing special about his face, except that it was his face. Rhys had gone on dates, he’d even had a girlfriend for six months, but he never really got over his schoolboy crush. He’d never really tried.

 “Rhys, you—“ Tim began but that was as far as he would get, because Rhys took the opportunity to lunge forward and plant a bloody kiss right on his lips.

Tim did not kiss back. He did not even close his eyes. He stared at Rhys with wide eyes, stunned.

Rhys jerked back, exhaling hard. Unfortunately, because his mouth was still filled with blood, this meant that he sighed a spray of red mist over Tim’s mouth and nose.

Tim blinked. Realisation reared its monstrous head and Rhys knew, without a doubt, that he’d torpedoed his chances of ever seeing Tim naked ever again.

What happened next was a bit of a blur. Rhys made excuses, talked quickly, and exited the situation without grace but with a great deal of speed. Tim didn’t speak. He stood with a stunned expression on his blood-splattered face.

After Madam Wick healed his lip—which took no time at all, as predicted—Rhys slunk back to his common room to hide for the rest of his school career. He drank until he was drunk (which took only about three mouthfuls) and fell asleep.

Silence fell, thick and hot, in the backseat of their Lyft. Tim held his mouth with one hand, the lines at the corners of his eyes crinkling. Rhys kept himself rigid, determined to look unbowed and proud. His hands lay in tight fists on his thighs.

Finally, Tim said: “You never spoke to me again after that.”

Rhys let out a bark of incredulous laughter. “Can you blame me? I painted your face with blood. Not exactly the most romantic foot to start out on.”

“Not unless I was a vampire,” Tim said.

Rhys shifted in his seat, cast his gaze to the lights flashing past outside the window. “It’s a miracle I can even look at you now. Ten years ago, I would’ve burst into flames.”

“It wasn’t that bad…” Tim tried. His lips were trembling.

Rhys gave him a flat look. “Oh, really? Tell me that you haven’t told people about the weird kid who attacked your bath time and then sneezed blood on your face.” He leaned into Tim’s space. “Look me in the eyes and tell me you’ve never swapped that story with a bunch of people talking about their worst hook-ups.”

“It wasn’t really a hook-up,” Tim said.

Rhys nudged him. “But you did talk about it.”

“Where are we going, anyway?” Tim asked. Rhys sat back, crossing his arms over his chest.

“You’ll see.”

They pulled up in front of the office park almost twenty minutes after they left the restaurant. Three buildings stood sentry around a cobblestone square with a sunken fountain set into the centre. There were some trees, but not many.

If the Lyft driver thought it was strange Rhys had asked her to bring them out to the middle of corporate nowhere, she didn’t see fit to mention it. Although she may have taken a long look at his face, just in case the cops came round with questions later.

A breeze stirred, knocking the long, dried grass of the surrounding fields into waves of green and brown. Fluorescent, energy efficient lighting buzzed high, high above. Tim stuck his hands in the pockets of his blue windbreaker and stared up at the bleached out night sky.

“This is romantic,” he said.

“Just wait,” Rhys said.

Rhys could blame what he did next on a lot of different factors. He was no longer a stupid, horny teenager, no matter what his friends sometimes accused him of. He was an adult, with a savings account, a promising career, and a good head on his shoulders.

But. The memory of Tim’s terrified, blood splattered face haunted him. His hands tingled. He had to make up for it—for everything.

He took Tim inside.

“Are you going to murder me?” Tim teased. The interior of Rhys’ office was lit only by the safety lights set into the ceiling, casting everything in shadow. It could’ve been romantic, or it could’ve been the set to a horror movie. Rhys grabbed Tim’s hand, determined for the former.

“I want to show you something,” Rhys said.

“I bet you do,” Tim said with a friendly leer. Rhys scoffed and gave his hand a squeeze. “Although I would’ve been just as happy going back to your place…”

Rhys’ fingers spasmed, the tips growing red hot for a split-second. Tim’s hand twitched in Rhys’ grip but he didn’t pull away. For a moment, Rhys wondered if he’d felt it.

Magic held its own promise. The ability to turn the impossible to the possible. To fly, to make other people fly (even if only briefly), to change your shape, to change the shape of things, to mould the world, charm and hex, enchant and curse. Rhys couldn’t imagine giving it up.

“The worst thing  I can imagine is being a squib,” he said as he lead them down the halls.

Tim gave him a funny look. “The worst thing I can imagine is being dead.”

They walked and Tim’s expression changed into one Rhys found familiar. The look of a person trying to chart their passage, trying to map out their twists and turns. The interior of Rhys’ office building was a veritable labyrinth, albeit one with grey carpeting and off-white walls. Magic changed its shape, made spaces open like blooming flowers in the mundane block buildings. At the heart of it was Rhys’ pride and joy. The Stellarium. He brought them to a stop in front of a set of heavy oak doors, their age incongruous with the rest of their surroundings. A bronze plaque announced they’d arrived to the right place.

“Huh,” Tim said. Rhys grinned at him.

“You ready to see something pretty amazing?” he asked.

“Are you gonna unzip your pants?” Tim asked. “Cause I might leave.”

Rhys’ flushed. “I’m not,” he said, trying not to feel too pleased at Tim’s ‘might’.

He reached out and pressed his thumb against the keyhole. Recognition sparked from him to the mechanics within. The door unlocked with a click and swung on its silent hinges. Cool air unfurled from within, like it’d been huddled against the door just waiting to escape. It smelled like ozone, like mountain peaks, and it suggested the vast space that lay beyond.

Rhys flicked his wand at the light switch.

“Whoa,” Tim said. He stared up at the domed ceiling as white-gold light filled the room.

“Watch your step,” Rhys said.

The room was nearly circular. Black, glossy panels created a dome above their heads, reinforced with bronze struts. The black, marble floor sank in steps to a dais, where a control panel-like device sat in the centre. Tim walked slowly inside, his head tilted back, mouth hanging open.

“I feel like I’m inside a desk globe. How is this room in the building?” he asked.

Rhys flicked his wand at the control panel, which roused itself to life with a panel of lights. “Magic,” he said, more than a little smug. “You might’ve forgotten, as you live your life like a mundie, but magic is actually pretty cool.”

Rhys took up position in the interior curve of the panel, tapped his wand on its lip like a conductor preparing to orchestrate.

“I haven’t forgotten,” Tim said, still staring at the roof. “What is this place for?”

Rhys reached for a jeweled orb set in the centre of the panel and gave it a twist. It spun for a moment before stopping with a click. Tim flinched as the lights died, leaving them back in the smothering dark.

“Rhys—?” He sounded nervous, which was interesting. Rhys reached out and gripped his arm with one hand, the other sliding a few knobs up their tracks.

Light returned, but not the same lights. The glass panels above their heads shimmered and changed. The dome above their heads vanished, leaving them in space, surrounded by stars that flowed like rivers. Tim exhaled a curse.

The illusion was perfect. Stars clustered in glowing nebulae, twinkling like gems set in velvet. The floor under their feet felt solid, but Rhys knew that if he looked down, he’d see the vastness of space.

“Holy shit,” Tim said, staring at his feet with wide eyes.

“Careful,” Rhys said. “The first time I was in here, I nearly threw my lunch up onto my shoes.”

“Yeah,” Tim said weakly. He looked pale, awed, and a little ill. Exactly the way Rhys had felt during their first successful activation.

“It’s okay, you know,” Rhys said. He slid his hand down Tim’s arm. “We haven’t actually gone anywhere. This is just an illusion.” He gripped Tim’s hand.

“It’s a pretty good fucking illusion,” Tim said. He gave Rhys a squeeze.

Rhys’ chest swelled with pride. “Well. I’m a pretty good fucking illusionist.”

Tim cut him a look. A violet-blue nebula caught in the reflection of his eyes, almost drowning out the blue and green. “You made this?”

“Yes. Well.” Rhys cleared his throat. “Some of it. Most of it, really. It’s meant for divination. A lot of for-profit organizations are looking for ways to predict market growth, economic rise and falls, that kind of thing.”

“Wait.” Tim blinked, a star flaring and dying in his pupils. “This— This whole thing, this incredible machine—it’s meant to make money?”

The outrage in Tim’s voice reminded Rhys of the disappointment he’d felt himself when his boss informed him what the Stellarium was meant for. “Yeah, well. What else could we use it for?” Rhys asked, echoing what Mr Henderson had told him.

“It’s— I guess so. It’s just so… sad. All this work… It must’ve taken forever,” Tim said.

Thousands of years flashed past in an instant, and the stars around them changed subtly. Rhys could guide them in time, or he could strand them in a moment. He left the machine to cycle through to the future, letting the stars flow, letting them flare and burn and die, and new ones born from the energy left behind. Rhys had a layman’s understanding of astronomy, but he understood that matter remained and nothing really ended.

“It did. It’s still not ready.” Rhys tipped his head back and watched a green and red nebula twist across the sky, like a scrap of silk caught in the wind. He glanced at Tim, who he found watching the change above them, shadows moving across his face in the shift of light. “If it’s any consolation, I don’t think divination is real. And if it is real, I don’t think the stars care about our commerce.”

“What if it was real?” Tim asked. “What do you think the stars would care about, if they cared about anything?” He turned his head, met Rhys’ eye. Rhys shrugged.

“Only important stuff,” he suggested.

Tim nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, only big stuff. Celestial stuff. Stuff we couldn’t even understand, that wouldn’t even impact us…” His voice faded. Something new was born what seemed like twenty feet above their heads, a galaxy spinning out from the heart of an explosion.

“Divination was my least favourite class,” Rhys said.

Tim wrinkled his nose. “I kind of liked it. I didn’t believe in it either,” he added quickly, catching Rhys’ gaze as if to reassure him.

“Why’d you like it?” Rhys asked.

“It was quiet and warm,” Tim said. “And I liked the stories behind the constellations.” He flicked his gaze back to the ceiling. It was kind of funny, Rhys supposed, that everyone who came into the Stellarium looked up when the stars surrounded them on all sides.

The light played across Tim’s face, blue and violet and white. Rhys could see the sky in miniature, reflected in the gloss of Tim’s eyes. He felt an absurd urge to reach out and brush the stars away.

“I liked them too,” Rhys said instead.

Did Rhys believe in destiny? Ten, fifteen years ago, he might’ve said that he did. Children believe in predestination more easily because all children, everywhere, secretly believe they are living a story. Stories are planned, they’re overseen by a guiding force. Things that happen are meant to happen.

Yesterday, Rhys would’ve had said that he didn’t. Since leaving Hogwarts, since growing older, he’d gained a more sophisticated understanding of the world and his place within it. He knew that life didn’t make sense, that existence was chaos, entropy. Things lived and died without any order or meaning except for the ones granted by people. Stuff happened.

Now, though. Standing there, in the heart of the dream-like swirl of stars and nebula, galaxies and black holes, surrounded by the evidence of a massive, ever-changing universe that worked on a timescale beyond human understanding, Rhys wondered.

Tim had gotten closer. Rhys could still see the shine of stars in his eyes, the play of light on his face. Without thinking, Rhys put his hand on the sharp plane of Tim’s cheek.

“I don’t know,” Rhys confessed, answering his question.

Tim stood inches away, leaning in closer. Rhys could smell basil and ginger, soy sauce and wine. Under all that, he could smell something clean and sharp, like soap. The tips of his fingers tingled. He slid his hand down, cupping the back of Tim’s neck.

“Me neither,” Tim breathed and kissed him.

The stars should’ve gone nova, or maybe new ones should’ve spun together from the materials found in the vastness of space. The galaxy should’ve expanded and the universe continued its cycle towards the end of all things, to the cessation of light and heat. It did none of those things.

The stars twinkled above and around them. When Rhys opened his eyes, he could see Tim staring back. The stars were inside of him, too.