Summary: heejin and hyunjin learn that platonic flirting isn't platonic if they LIKE like each other. that just makes it flirting.

aka heejin and hyunjin are blushing messes and their friends are sick and tired of watching them send heart eyes to each other without acknowledging their feelings.

~

Hyunjin does end up transporting to Heejin during the summer.

Gratefully, she doesn’t end up in her bathtub, but instead, in Heejin’s room. With great timing, Heejin hadn’t been out with her family or her friends. There in her room, fingerpicking at her guitar, Heejin startles at the sudden appearance of Hyunjin flashing into her room and wobbling due to the sudden bending of space and distance.

Heejin yelps and plucks hard enough at a guitar string that the string reverberates back almost violently due to the force applied to it. Heejin, wide eyed and surprised, can only look as Hyunjin fixes her hair, straightens out her clothes, smiles at her, and waves.

“Hi Heekie! Good thing I didn’t end up anywhere else! It would have been real awkward trying to explain, pretty much, everything about this.”

Hyunjin laughs and claps her hands at the humor she feels at the pure shock screaming from Heejin’s face.

“I told you I’d be coming around; why are you so surprised?”

Heejin sputters and gestures to her.

“You’re in my room! Suddenly! And you used a broken clothes hanger to get here? That’s not normal!”

Hyunjin runs her hand through her hair and sits on Heejin’s bed, “Nothing about magic is normal to you, Heejin. Kinda like how that picture on your desk isn’t moving isn’t normal to me.”

(In the picture frame is a photo of Heejin with her family. Her parents are squishing her in a hug and her smile is bright and pure, untainted by the reality of the world.)

Hyunjin adds in afterthought, “Unfortunate that muggle pictures don’t move. Your smile when you laugh and how you sound is really nice. Feels a lot warmer hearing you.”

Not even five minutes with Hyunjin, the girl is already making her heart race (minus the obvious fact that her spontaneous appearance almost gave Heejin a heart attack). The girl feels her cheeks warm at the compliment and she squirms at Hyunjin’s forwardness. Putting her guitar back on its stand and standing with her arms open, her friend leaves her bed with a charming smile on her lips.

Hugging Hyunjin is lovely. It’s even more lovely after not seeing her for almost two months. When their arms lock around each other and squeeze, it’s like their shoulders lose a tension that had unknowingly strung up at the disappearance of their presence.

(Heejin smells like flowers and it brings Hyunjin home. She doesn’t know when Heejin became such a comfort to her life; it seemed to her as if she just always has been. With a smile as warm, arms as welcoming, and a heart as caring, Hyunjin’s stood no chance in staying away from her—from not finding a home in Heejin’s.)

“I didn’t know you play guitar.”

Heejin nods and there is a twinkle of pride shines in her eyes, “I’ve been playing for four years now! I used to have really nasty calluses starting out, but, now, they’re only slightly nasty!”

Showing Hyunjin the tips of her left fingers, the other girl can see how the tips look a little rougher than the other hand’s.

“Here! You can feel the difference.”

Taking Hyunjin’s hand and splaying her fingers out and using her palm, Heejin runs the tips of her right fingers over it and its smooth journey sends goosebumps up her back. (Whenever Heejin traces her fingers over Hyunjin’s arms, she always feels the same sensation.) When Heejin does the same action with her left hand, the tips of her fingers are only slightly rougher, tough from the steel of her guitar strings. Hyunjin never really noticed the difference until today, didn’t mind the feeling, in fact, welcomed it. After trailing the tips of her fingers up the expanse of her palm, Heejin continues forward and slips her fingers in between the gaps of Hyunjin’s and squeezes.

The smile that graces Hyunjin’s face is endeared and soft. Looking at their intertwined hands, Hyunjin flicks her gaze between that and Heejin’s eyes that are curved in slight crescents, “What are you doing?”

Heejin only seems to have the slightest bit of shyness when she admits, “I like holding your hands. So, I’m holding your hand.”

The small smile on Hyunjin’s lips blooms like flowers do. Unravelling her fingers from Heejin’s and laying her palm flat against hers, Hyunjin bends the tops of her fingers over Heejin’s.

“Your hands are so small.”

Heejin whines and slips their fingers together again, “It’s not me! Your hands are freakishly large!”

Hyunjin laughs and the sound of it calls Heejin home.

When the pair comes out of Heejin’s room and goes to the kitchen, Heejin’s mother welcomes Hyunjin as if she came through the front door and didn’t appear in the middle of thin air. (Her father, on the other hand, looks absolutely lost and confused.) Dinner is had with Hyunjin sat next to Heejin and it is nothing less than wonderful how Hyunjin seamlessly melds in with Heejin’s family and interacts with them.

(Heejin’s parents have already heard plenty of Hyunjin (and all of the other girls) and it’s reassuring that Hyunjin is everything Heejin has professed and more. There’s certain things about her charm that are hard to capture in words. When Hyunjin laughs at a joke Heejin makes and their eyes capture each other’s in the split second of gazing over, her father doesn’t need to be a wizard to see a certain magic in between them.)

Hyunjin offers to wash the dishes after dinner (at first Heejin’s parents deny, but, Hyunjin reasons that for the delicious dinner that was prepared, it was only fair that they relax and that her and Heejin clean up the mess) and when the girl chooses not to do an incantation spell and instead rolls up her sleeves to proceed with cleaning, it’s not just Heejin that is swept away from her charm.

Wordlessly, the respect Hyunjin shows to Heejin’s parents and the rules of their household, is something that is greater than just an impression. It denotes her sense of what is appropriate and her politeness.

When Heejin sidles up next to Hyunjin to rinse the dishes, she can’t help but to be cognizant of how her heart thumps in her chest for her. Liking Hyunjin never equated to anything she felt for anyone else. Sure, she liked Chaewon and Jiwoo and everyone else, they were her friends after all, but she always liked Hyunjin in a different way.

When she was younger, Heejin would just accept the feeling for what it was and never questioned it. In the chaos of learning and growing, Heejin couldn’t afford herself the time to question what her feelings meant.

“I like Hyunjin. And that’s that.”

Now, with more time afforded to her and a more mature mindset, Heejin wonders what this meant. Nothing can be changed about her liking Hyunjin, not that she had a desire to, anyway. Hyunjin is nothing short of amazing and wonderful and pleasant—from how coolly she handles herself to how reactive she is in protecting her loved ones. Liking Hyunjin is not the problem, it never was. How Heejin likes her and what she should do about it is the can of worms the girl wants to open.

Lost in her thoughts, Heejin doesn’t notice the pile of dishes on her side growing until Hyunjin nudges at her with her elbow. When Hyunjin shakes her head to whip away her bangs that begin to fall, Heejin doesn’t have the conscious ability to stop her hands from tucking the stray locks of her hair carefully behind the girl’s ear so to avoid hurting the piercing that rests at the helix.

The presence of the running water is nothing compared to the intensity shining in Heejin’s eyes. Locking eyes with her, Heejin doesn’t look away like she normally would. Confronted with her sincere eyes, the light pink at her cheeks, and a heavy silence weighed with something intangible, Hyunjin’s heart races at the tension buzzing between them.

When she speaks, her voice comes out quiet, as if she was afraid of bursting their intimate bubble, “Thank you.”

Heejin nods and quirks a smile at her before looking away and rinsing the soapy dishes of its suds. Caught, somehow, on Heejin, it takes Hyunjin a moment to return back to scrubbing.

The silence that wafts between them isn’t awkward—there’s just something there.

Something they both know, but, lost on how to approach.

(The silence doesn’t last long because Hyunjin finishes washing the dishes and flicks some of the remnants of the bubbly suds on her hands at Heejin’s back. The girl rinsing yelps and turns around with her wet hands. Not letting her get away with it, Heejin shakes her drenched hands at Hyunjin’s body and Hyunjin can’t help but to squeal too.

When Hyunjin picks up a rag to wipe up the water on the floor, Heejin’s laughter is sweet and warm.)

~

After getting ready for bed, Hyunjin has to do a double take at Heejin when she pads out of her bathroom. With her hair down, wearing a large white baggy shirt and plaid pajama bottoms, brown wire circle-framed glasses sit on the bridge of Heejin’s nose.

It’s almost scary how much Hyunjin’s heart flutters at the sight. And how great the urge is to scream into Heejin’s pillow because of how cute the girl looks.

(It shouldn’t be fair for her to be that heart-stoppingly cute.)

“I forgot that you wear glasses.”

Heejin blushes and lowers her head.

It’s not that she doesn’t like wearing her glasses outside of the time after she washes her face, but, Heejin lives a large proportion of her life wearing contacts. Having people who normally see her as such with glasses instead usually prompts reaction. (Although, Heejin doesn’t hate how Hyunjin smiled at her when she made the comment—in fact, she rather liked it.)

“It’s cute.”

Heejin feels like her ears are burning. If her cheeks could steam from heat, she’s sure they would at Hyunjin’s blunt admission.

Turning off her lights (and using her phone’s light to navigate her way to her bed) and slipping underneath her covers beside Hyunjin, she takes her Stitch doll into her arms.

Almost mumbling, her voice is quiet, “I’ll be sure to wear it more often then.”

Hyunjin turns in the bed to face her, “And I’ll be sure to tell you how nice they look on you.”

Blushing, Heejin doesn’t know what to do with Hyunjin’s forward attention and forces the girl to turn away from her.

Even with her lights off, Heejin worries that the light from the moon shining through her window in the room is enough to show how hot her cheeks burn.

“I like being the big spoon” does well enough to excuse her reason for hiding.

(Heejin does like being the big spoon, though. So, when Hyunjin wakes up past the arrival of the sun, the weight of Heejin’s arm draped over her stomach and the feeling of her slow breathing against the juncture of where her neck and shoulder meets doesn’t surprise her.

That doesn’t make the racing of her heart calm any less, though.)

At the arrival of a new day, Heejin tells Hyunjin that she had signed up for a dance workshop at a studio not far from her home. Inviting Hyunjin to watch, she doesn’t even hesitate before accepting Heejin’s offer.

When Heejin drives to the studio (she had begun learning to drive the week of returning back home after passing her permit test last winter break) with the watchful guidance of her father, the studio is modern and large.

Dancing reminds Hyunjin of Sooyoung. Hyunjin remembers the many conversations she would have with their friends about dancing: the recitals she would do, how much she wished Hogwarts would have occasions for her to dance for other than the Yule Ball.

Hyunjin wishes to watch her dance at some point in her life. With the passion that fires behind Sooyoung’s eyes, there could be nothing but greatness watching her.

When the two girls walk in, Heejin whispers into the other girl’s ear about how much dancing has reminded her of Sooyoung too. The same wavelengths they walk on bounce at their synchronicity.

The room that the workshop is in is relatively full of dancers, but, Hyunjin doesn’t need to search for Heejin to spot her. (It’s because she chose to wear a highlighter green shirt and in the mess of white, black, and grey, the girl stands out like a sore thumb. But, it’s also because Hyunjin is so accustomed to finding Heejin in crowds, what with quidditch and how Heejin is still adamant on wearing various Slytherin accessories to support her during her games. The sight of Heejin wearing the Slytherin tie under her red and gold robes still endears Hyunjin like no other. If anything, the sight just gets more and more appealing to her as each year passes.

There’s something about this girl and the color green.)

Watching through the room’s large window, Hyunjin is not the only person there surveying the workshop. As the dancers stretch, Hyunjin fiddles with Heejin’s phone. The girl had handed her phone to her to stave off any boredom that should occur. The brief run through Heejin gave before leaving is blurry so the girl just taps at various things, almost calls Heejin’s mother, and swipes to find the folder labelled “Games”. Before tapping on a game, however, Heejin’s phone vibrates and it startles Hyunjin so much that she almost drops the device. The icon of the notification that appears is green with a speech bubble in it. In bold, Jinsol’s nickname is written.

Jindori <3: bts has nothing on you! good luck at dance today!!

Tapping at the notification, the screen changes to the window with the thread of their messages.

Heekie: I don’t know who bts is. What’s a bts?

Jindori <3: ….this isnt heejin..she doesnt type w correct punctuation. ...and she really likes bts. .. ...WHO IS THIS WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO HER

Heekie: It’s Hyunjin. I’m at her dance practice. She’s stretching right now.

Jindori <3: omg i thought someone stole her phone… .i was abt to track her to take the thief down

Hyunjin screws her face up in confession. Tracking? How could Jinsol track her when she was in a completely different realm of living?

Heekie: Track?

Jindori <3: yea! iphone users can track other iphone users with their permission! here’s my location!

Jindori <3: i mean,....not exact location .. bc im .. . .. Not with muggles rn.. ..

There in the thread, a bubble appears with a picture of a map. In the picture, a red pin locates a spot that Hyunjin assumes is meant to symbolize Jinsol.

Somewhere in the United Kingdom, Jinsol is located, and as the map shows, near a body of water.

The sound of music interrupts Hyunjin mid reply. Looking up, there is a group of people facing the mirror and Heejin is stood at the side watching the group. Erasing her current reply, Hyunjin sends a text back before pocketing Heejin’s phone.

Heekie: Heejin’s going to start dancing soon. Mail you later! Have fun at quidditch practice!

Jinsol’s reply is immediate and prompts Hyunjin to quickly glance at it.

Jindori <3: will do!!! buy heejin a water bottle! she forgets water often!

Trying to recall, Hyunjin confirms Jinsol’s claim and ruffles through her pocket for the money Heejin had given her.

“In case you want snacks! This is enough for two bags of chips. That’s ten sickles worth.”

Approaching the machine that Heejin had pointed to earlier while talking about snacks, the one next to it advertises water. Staring at it, Hyunjin realizes she doesn’t know how to operate said machine. With folded pound sterlings in her hand, Hyunjin stares at the contraption, unsure of what to do. A picture next to a thin slot depicts a pound sterling being slid in. Following the picture, Hyunjin gasps in shock when the machine swallows the pound sterlings she slots in.

Scratching at the temple of her head with her pointer finger, Hyunjin mumbles to herself, “What do I do now?”

The clear case protecting the drinks shows a series of waters and energy drinks. Assigned with a letter and a number, Hyunjin looks to the keypad at the side and presses at the pad the sequence below the drink advertising water. Pressing it and looking back to the case, the water is pushed forward by a force unseen. (Hyunjin flinches back at how the drink falls.) Dropping to the bottom of the machine, Hyunjin hesitantly pushes through the metal flap. Reaching in, her fingers are met with a cold bottle of water. Pulling her hand out, her eyes are amazed at how the machine works.

Muggles could have their own magic too, it appears.

(Unbeknownst to her, Heejin noticed a Hyunjin shaped gap missing at the window and when she finds her at the vending machine for drinks looking utterly puzzled and lost, Heejin can’t help but to muse at how amusingly cute she looks. Watching the process of Hyunjin figuring out how the machine works is adorable. Heejin hopes that she looks even a quarter of how cute Hyunjin does now when she discovers new things about magic.

She does. And a quarter is not even barely enough to describe how much.

Hyunjin would know. Her heart has done many a somersault at the sight.

When Hyunjin pulls the drink out and her eyes light up with wonder, Heejin muffles her laughter. A friend beside her from the class looks at her in curiosity and follows Heejin’s eyes. Teasingly lifting her eyebrows at her, Heejin can’t help the shy smile that comes.)

When it is Heejin’s turn to dance, Hyunjin feels her excitement b. If this was how Heejin felt while watching her quidditch matches, Hyunjin understands now why Heejin is so adamant on showing her support. (Because a part of support is pride, and for Heejin, Hyunjin has a lot of it.)

A Korean song blasts through the speakers and the way Heejin adopts a new attitude is incredible. Her facial expression is cool and confident; swaggy in a way that makes Hyunjin feel hot. When Heejin dances, it’s a burst of energy and sharp movements. She’s perfect in executing the moves, her facial expressions are even dancing well with the song.

She’s captivating, magnetic.

And gosh, it’s so attractive how damn confident she looks with that smirk and her eyebrow that raises when she stands at the center and lip syncs with the singer. When she smiles, it’s not the usual one that beams, the one Hyunjin loves. It’s different. Almost cocky and reeking with nonchalance, it’s as if Heejin knows how cool she looks.

Hyunjin still loves the smile. This one just makes her feel uncomfortably warm.

After the dance is finished and Heejin breaks character, it gives Hyunjin whiplash how quickly Heejin returns to the being Hyunjin is more familiar with. Same dorky smile with her crescent smiling moon eyes, Hyunjin stood no chance against internally swooning.

Aside from the rush of blood to her cheeks, there is a rush of pride and admiration for Heejin. To be able to dance so well, to make it look so effortless, is a feat that is not easy to acquire.

Hyunjin completely gets why Heejin is so stubborn about wearing her house colors at matches now. If Hyunjin had the visual representation to connect herself with Heejin, she would wear it—show it—without hesitance.

(With the pride Hyunjin feels over Heejin, a part of her heart warms at Heejin feeling the same intense thing. It does something to her confidence and her drive—makes her want to work even harder, to be someone Heejin could be proud of. And a Gryffindor’s pride is something much stronger than a flimsy house of cards. Having Heejin being proud of her is more than just a simple accomplishment. It’s an honor and Hyunjin will not be the one to lose it.)

Finishing the class, Heejin walks out through the doors of the room with rosy cheeks and some of her hairs sticking to her forehead.

Hyunjin finally understands why Heejin was too embarrassed to admit being attracted to the sight of Hyunjin just coming from quidditch practice. Hyejoo had told Hyunjin one day during breakfast, thanks to Yerim being unable to stopping from running, thus, allowing for Hyejoo to find out. Chaewon stood no chance at covering Yerim’s mouth and stopping her from telling the Slytherin because she was too occupied with casting practice spells.

“Heejin thinks you look hot in your uniform.”

Hyunjin balks, feels her cheeks flame up, and thanks Merlin that she hadn’t taken a drink from her goblet yet otherwise Hyejoo, or at least her own clothes, would be covered in orange juice.

“Oh.”

“Chaewon and Yerim think I look hot, too.”

“Oh.”

Hyejoo laughs and it cools the burning of her cheeks.

When Hyunjin meets up with Heejin later on at the clock tower, the girl has a smirk on her lips and it’s enough to make Heejin question what was on her mind.

“So, I look hot in my quidditch uniform?”

Heejin sputters and suddenly finds her shoes to be the most interesting thing in the world.

“Well, I mean, maybe. I mean- it’d be a lie if I said no.”

Hyunjin laughs and Heejin pushes her shoulder at Hyunjin’s teasings.

“Thank you for thinking I look hot when I, honestly, feel dead inside with exhaustion.”

When Heejin didn’t think she could blush any more than she already was, Hyunjin proves her wrong. Heejin tucks her head in Hyunjin’s neck and throws her arms across the girl’s torso to hold her to physically show how embarrassed she was to have Hyunjin find out such coveted information. Muffled by how deep Heejin pushed into her neck, Heejin mumbles “you’re welcome” and then decides to make a permanent shell out of Hyunjin’s body.

Hyunjin laughs again, but, rubs comfortingly at Heejin’s back.

When Heejin walks up to her, Hyunjin offers her the water she bought.

“How was I?”

Hyunjin is at a loss of words. Or better, lost in the sea of complimenting words.

Heejin quirks her eyebrow and jests, “That bad?”

(Heejin knows that that isn’t the case. She saw how she looked in the mirror. She looked ing awesome.)

Hyunjin waves her hands and frantically shakes her head.

“No! You were incredible! You looked super cool and in your element and confident and really really hot.”

Hyunjin freezes and rests her forehead in her palm.

“Hot?”

Hyunjin doesn’t need to look up to know that Heejin’s lips are in the same smirk that she had in the dance. She can hear it.

Unable to speak, or rather, unwilling to, Hyunjin only nods her head.

“Really really hot?”

Hyunjin whines and swats at Heejin’s shoulder, “Yes! You were really hot! Is that what you wanted to hear?”

Not counting on Hyunjin’s forwardness, Heejin pauses before answering, “I- yes. I did. Want to hear that.”

Now looking up, Hyunjin is met with Heejin looking the complete counter of what she was during the dance. Timid and shy, her eyes flick up at Hyunjin before she takes a gulp of water. Confident now, and no longer under the pressure of admitting the truth, Hyunjin’s voice is softer, not as forced and annoyed, “Well, you looked really good, Heejin. It’s like you were shining. I could only look at you.”

If Heejin could dig a hole for herself to live in, or if there was a spell for it, Heejin would have done it so that Hyunjin wouldn’t be able to see how much her honesty affected her.

“You deserve to hear it. Knowing you, you probably worked really hard to perfect that dance to perform it as well as you did.”

Heejin only nods because it is the simple truth. She had spent grueling hours trying to nail the moves in synchronization with the group and even more hours trying to get her face to act accordingly with the feeling of the song. Hyunjin pats her back in comfort and before she can talk, a girl from Heejin’s class taps on her shoulder.

“Great job today, Heejin! You killed it!”

Heejin laughs and compliments the girl back.

The girl then looks at Hyunjin and back at Heejin, “So, who’s this?”

Heejin looks to Hyunjin and her eyes widen at the slightest. (It’s not like she could have said “this is Hyunjin, my super rad wizard friend who I like and would probably die for!”)

Gesturing towards Hyunjin, Heejin panics in the point two seconds it takes for her to start talking, “Uh- this is Hyunjin! She’s a friend of mine from the new school I transferred to!”

Although not the complete truth, Heejin is reassured when her friend shakes Hyunjin’s hand and a