In times like this, there is only one way to react: Pull the through the situation, no matter how unbelievable or ridiculous it is. At least, that is Min Yoongi’s way of life.

He smiles his professional shop assistant smile at Jimin. “How can I help you?“

If the situation was a different one, Yoongi might laugh at Jimin’s face, but this is him, a supposed pure blooded wizard, obviously working at a Muggle electronics shop, being busted by the most inconvenient person.

“What... what are you doing here, Yoongi?“, Jimin stutters, his pretty mo-, no, his normal mouth still in an O-shape.

Yoongi thanks all the gods there might be, but mostly himself for his acting skills. Seemingly completely unfazed, he says: “Working, of course. So, what do you need?“ He even manages to keep his sweet smile plastered on his face.

Jimin is still gawking and Yoongi plays through every possible scenario in his head. A study project for Muggle Studies? Ridiculous, he doesn’t even take this class. Curiosity? Haha Min Yoongi, the great pure blooded Slytherin, isn’t interested in Muggles, of course.

But... why is Park Jimin here? Doesn’t his father hate Muggles? Ever since Yoongi saw and heard Jimin’s father on that fateful day at Platform 9 3/4, he always thought... always assumed Jimin wasn’t very fond of Muggles as well. That is why he lied in the first place, right?

To impress the boy in front of him who smiled like sunshine.

Yoongi swallowed. Of course there is no way he would ever tell somebody in Hogwarts that he is Muggle born. But... but this boy here is definitely looking for something in an electronics shop. He takes Muggle Studies (not that Yoongi knows Jimin’s time table by heart or something, by no means). He looks like the nicest, sweetest person in the world (except for the fact that he hates Yoongi because he is a Slytherin, but doesn’t he have every reason to?). And Yoongi is tired, so tired of not telling anybody except Kookie.

So tired of not being close to the boy he has been in love with for five years.

___________________

There was always a strange pull in Jimin’s chest when he saw Yoongi in the hallways, the pang of disappointment lasted more than a year.

At first Yoongi still greeted him, tried to talk to him before and after classes, but Jimin ignored him.

It was two weeks after the day they met when another Slytherin first year said: “Ignore him, Yoongi, Gryffindors are just arrogant like that. Think they are so much better than Slytherins because they are oh so righteous and love justice.“

Yoongi tilted his head and looked at Jimin, who feigned not to listen. “Yeah... he said he hated Slytherin but I thought, I... oh. Well.“

Jimin was sure the hurt undertone was only his imagination. A Muggle hating Slytherin scumbag like Yoongi, hurt because Jimin didn’t want to be friends with him? Ridiculous.

In their second year, Yoongi got elected as Seeker for the Slytherin Quidditch team and Jimin became a Beater. True, Jimin was as small as Yoongi, but he was stronger and his hit got really powerful, especially when they had matches against Slytherin and he saw the lithe, clever Seeker fly around him. Yoongi’s playing style got very unpopular very quickly with the other teams; his flying skills were extraordinary. As long as he didn’t see the Snitch, he flew quick zig zag manoeuvres, passing by the opposing team members only by centimetres, effectively distracting them so his team could score undisturbed.

Jimin hated Yoongi’s cocky grin when Slytherin won the House Cup that year, Jimin hated how everyone admired his flying. He hated the loud and boisterous laughter from the Slytherin table, that reminded him so much of his stupid father that didn’t allow him to bring home his Muggle born friend over the holidays.

Yoongi looked so happy, it made Jimin sick. So when Yoongi looked right into his eyes during their party in the great hall, his sweet smile so happy and hopeful, he immediately looked away.

In their third year, both of them began to bully each other.

Jimin would make Yoongi trip over his foot in the hallways. Yoongi would find out some clever little charm so that Jimin’s chubby cheeks grew some kind of orange fur, calling him “the ugliest hamster alive“ for weeks (all the Slytherins joined, of course). Jimin would retaliate. Yoongi would re-retaliate.

They never openly fought, never said their curses directly to the other one. Always behind their backs, always sneakily.

During that year, Jimin noticed a little Slytherin boy with bunny teeth tagging after Yoongi wherever the older one went. A first year, and he looked so cute and anxious Jimin almost forgot that he was Slytherin. Apparently, he saw some kind of mentor in Yoongi, and while Yoongi kept his usual cold and haughty demeanor that he developed during this year, there was a certain warmth around those two.

One day Jimin walked into the bathroom in the cellars, urgently having to take a piss before that god forsaken Potions class, when he heard soft sobbing.

“Yoongi, they... they called me Mudblood! I’m a weirdo!“

“Shh, Jungkookie, they’re idiots. You’re not weird, you are great the way you are.“

Jimin stilled. That was definitely Min Yoongi’s voice, he would recognize it everywhere. And he was comforting a Muggle born boy?

He peeked around the corner just to see Yoongi hugging the little bunny boy. Before either of them could notice him, he walked out to find another bathroom, no matter how urgent his need.

Bunny Boy had to have some influence on some teachers or something, so that Yoongi could get some advantage or reward out of taking care of him, right? Otherwise Min Yoongi wouldn’t do a thing like this.

Right?

___________________

“Earphones. But why are you working here?!“ Jimin thinks of all the instances Yoongi talked bad about Muggles...

Which is one. One time. During their first day.

Yoongi sneers. Just this facial expression alone makes Jimin’s old rage burn in his stomach.

“I know you aren’t the brightest star in the night sky, Park Jiminnie, but think for a little and mayyybe you can figure it out. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have those heavy- boxes here, and my boss is waiting. Come to me when you finally figured out what you want, I’ll get it for you and then you leave.“

And with those words, he just walks away.

Min Yoongi just knows how to push Jimin’s buttons. Jimin doesn’t know what to say, so he just tags along.

He follows Yoongi throughout the shop and they don’t say a word. So... So why is Yoongi here, working? There can just be one explanation.

Min Yoongi is a Muggle born.

But why would Yoongi lie about it? Why would he lie about it before even getting into Slytherin? Of course, he would keep up with the lie there, but... Why would he lie to Jimin specifically, on their first train ride to Hogwarts.

Well, what would have I done, knowing nothing about the Wizarding World?

He tries to imagine this obnoxious, confident teenager in front of him as an anxious, insecure child, but he can’t really. Min Yoongi is the embodiment of arrogance.

___________________

Yoongi might be good at pretending and lying to others, but that came with a certain prize: He knew himself way too well and couldn’t lie to himself even for a second.

Which made every attack on Jimin, every joke about the chubby cheeked boy with the smile like sunshine, deliberate, done to do harm.

To harm the person he is fairly certain he is in love with.

There hadn’t been a day for Min Yoongi on which he didn’t look out for Park Jimin in the Great Hall, only to be greeted by a venomous stare back. It didn’t really hurt anymore

(it did)

and he was used to it. He hated Gryffindors as well, he had to in order to fit in, just as he had to pretend to be pure blooded. It was stupid, but he started the lie, so he had to pull through. Pulling through was just Min Yoongi’s signature move.

But Yoongi wasn’t unhappy. He had friends that would die for him (and who he would die for), especially Jeon Jungkook. The boy was a huge source of comfort for Yoongi - although he would never tell him, of course - and when Kookie accidentally drank some Veritaserum and told everybody in the common room that he was Muggle born, Yoongi had been there for him, even told the inconsolable boy that he was one as well. Since that day, Jungkook didn’t leave his side, and while somewhat shy and annoying, Jungkook proved himself to be quick-witted and a fun and loyal friend.

Him, Min Yoongi, the star oft he Quidditch team, taking care of Jungkook made Kookie himself quite a popular person in the Slytherin common room as well. Yoongi noticed that people who called Muggle born ones “Mudbloods“ were a shrinking minority, and he wished he could out himself. But then there would be awkward questions and even more awkward answers, so he stayed quiet.

“Why do you hate each other so much?“, Seokjin, a tall and handsome Hufflepuff sixth year, asked Yoongi in his fifth year. They were sitting next to each other, Jungkook and Yoongi paying the Hufflepuff table a visit.

Jimin had just passed by and after Yoongi calling out “hey hamster boy“, not looking up while doing it of course, Jimin just dumped his pumpkin juice on Yoongi’s freshly bleached hair.

(Everyone thought Yoongi had already mastered look-changing charms. No one knew he had some bottles of hydrogen peroxide stacked under his bed.)

Yoongi blow-dried his hair with his wand and stayed quiet. On his other side, Hoseok, another Hufflepuff, but like Yoongi a fifth year, just snorted.

“Hate? Are you sure, Jin?“

Yoongi and Hoseok shared a lot of classes that year, and over a Potions project, the two of them became good friends. Because of Hoseok, he got acquainted to Seokjin as well, who apparently took it as his god-given task to be a mother to “his lost little snakes“ Yoongi and Jungkook, the latter of course having joined their little group as well.

“Shut up, Hobi“, Yoongi mumbled, quite upset that his now dry hair was still sticky and kind of orange from the sugary substance.

Hoseok kind of got Yoongi in a way the Slytherin boy didn’t really understand. But he was also thankful for it, because when Jimin arrived at the Gryffindor table and got greeted and kissed on the cheek by his latest boyfriend, Hoseok took Yoongi’s hand and squeezed it. Just for a second.

(Jungkook also saw way more than Yoongi could ever imagine. Later this day, Jimin’s boyfriend’s hair spontaneously started burning when he was walking down the hallway. When Jimin tried to put the fire out, the water that came out of his wand immediately turned into little baby snakes. When Jimin turned around, expecting Yoongi’s sneering face behind him, all he saw was Bunny Boy’s big round innocent eyes.)

___________________

Yoongi finally stops and puts down his boxes. He turns around and sees Jimin still standing behind him. Yoongi looks like he has hoped Jimin would just vanish.

Well, Jimin won’t. Not before finding out what the hell has been going on all those years.

Why the hell he maybe missed out on one of the best friendships he could have ever had with the boy that smiles like sugar, and not sneers in that arrogant way Jimin hates so much.

“Shall I get you some Ibuprofen for your head, hamster boy? You know, you look like you have some serious thinking going on, and that is a rarity for your poor brain.“

But Jimin ignores Yoongi’s bickering for a moment (also, what the hell is Ibuprofen). “Yoongi, why did you lie to me? On our first train ride? Give me an explanation!“

Jimin sounds serious, accusing even. Suddenly Yoongi doesn’t look aloof and detached anymore. For the first time since forever, Jimin sees a real emotion on Yoongi’s face – anger.

“Imagine knowing nothing about magic, about the Wizarding World, and you are ing five years old and your favourite crayons suddenly start growing legs and dance around your room just because you think that might be funny. Imagine you telling this to your parents, and your parents are suddenly super afraid and send you to a doctor because of that?“

Yoongi is getting loud all of a sudden. In any other case, Jimin would think it is an overreaction, but Yoongi talks with such fervour... Jimin is shocked.

He listens. And imagines.

“Imagine hiding your otherness from your family and friends, and then the letter comes, and you finally have an explanation, and your parents, who work off their asses for you to have a good life, are so happy, and you arrive at that magical train station with those magical people, you think you will have the time of your life, and the first thing you hear is how annoying it is that non-magical people are allowed to be there as well? And you just know you are not welcome. And then you come here, you, who doesn’t belong here, and you demand an explanation on why I have to earn some money for my family who has nothing, while your dad is apparently some great minister with money and fame who can talk about us Mudbloods just like that?“

There are customers staring, and Yoongi comes back to himself. Jimin feels like he cannot breathe, he feels like if he took a breathe it would turn out to be a sob, and he would start crying right here and there, but he cannot.

He has no right to in front of Min Yoongi, who wanted to explain, he suddenly remembers.

“Jimin, can I please talk to you?“

“Jimin, why won’t you say hi to me?“

“What is wrong, is it just because I am a Slytherin?“

Yoongi gives him one last hard look before turning away, vanishing behind a door that reads “Staff Room“.

Jimin slowly turns around – and sees that Yoongi has just put down his boxes next to the shelves with earphones.

Exiting the shop with a pair of earphones in his hand, tears start rolling down Park Jimin’s face.

~~~~~~~

I am just in love with commas, okay. I am German. I can't help it.

Thank you for all the comments and subscriptions on the last chapter!! I appreciate it so much. I hope you liked this one as well. And I promise there won't be nearly as many flashbacks in future chapters as in this one. I just felt the need to properly sketch out their relationship before their encounter in the electronics shop. But now, Jiminnie has finally exited the shop and we will see some other locations of the present.

Also, so many thanks to my beta reader who has to point out my mistakes. A degree in English is not useless after all :^D

I love this story and I still have many plans for it! Comments & subscriptions are my fuel.