A/N: A continuation of #6 (feline)

A laugh that is one part fear and one part excitement tears its way out of Jaebum’s throat as his eyes squint shut from the force of the wind. His arms tighten around Jackson’s waist and his thighs clench the broomstick as the two of them shoot through the air, and down towards the ground. Jackson waits so long to pulls up that the toes of Jaebum’s shoes brush against the ground.

“Isn’t this a bit too reckless?” Jaebum laughs breathlessly, leaning forward to tuck his chin over Jackson’s shoulder. The broom wobbles for a few seconds before Jackson gets it under control again. “See what I mean?” Jaebum says pointedly.

“I totally meant to do that,” Jackson sniffs. Jaebum can’t help but smile at the pink blooming on the other boy’s cheeks. “I’m the star player of the Hufflepuff Quidditch team and I’ve literally been flying since before I could walk, I know exactly what I’m doing.”

“Hufflepuff haven’t won the Quidditch cup in three years, are you sure that’s something to be bragging about?” Jaebum in a breath, his laughter cutting off as Jackson makes a series of sharp turns that nearly send him tumbling to the ground. “Woah,” he gasps, shifting forward on the broom until there isn’t even a hair’s breadth between him and Jackson, his arms wrapping even tighter around the other boy.

“Ah, ,” Jackson swears as the broom starts to wobble again. He’s not able to bring it back under control this time and he and Jaebum are sent tumbling to the ground.

“Did you mean to do that too?” Jaebum groans as he slowly pulls himself into a sitting position. Luckily for them, they weren’t too high in the air or moving too fast when they fell.

“Shut up,” Jackson grumbles, brushing dirt off his hands with a wince.

Jaebum scoots over in the grass until he’s within arm’s length. “Hey, are you okay?” He grabs the other boy’s hands and holds them out before Jackson can hide them.

“Ah, watch it,” Jackson jumps as Jaebum’s hand lightly brushes one of his fingers. Jaebum can feel his forehead crease as he frowns down at the slightly crooked appendage.

“Is it broken?”

“Don’t know,” Jackson grunts, breathing hard through his nose. Jaebum an eyebrow at him. “Alright, fine, maybe,” Jackson relents, looking away with a pout.

“Come on, let’s go see Madame Jongok,” Jaebum says, climbing to his feet and charming the grass off his robes.

“We literally just came from there,” Jackson groans as he gets up, cradling his injured hand to his chest. “She’s probably going to nail me with some long lecture before she heals me.”

“Well, you’re going to have to deal with it,” Jaebum firmly takes Jackson’s uninjured hand and pulls him off the pitch. For all his complaining, the other boy follows Jaebum with minimal resistance.

“Back so soon?” Madame Jongok asks dryly, a distinctly unimpressed look on her face.

“Looks like next week was something of a late estimate,” Jackson says with a sheepish grin. Her lips press together until they turn white, but no lecture spills from them. Instead, she simply heals Jackson in silence then and glares knives at the both of them until they scamper out of the Hospital Wing.

“You should at least try not to get yourself injured again in next week’s game,” Jaebum pants as they skid to a stop by the staircase. “Keep it up and she might start hurting you instead of healing you.”

“Have you even met me,” Jackson scoffs, adjusting his slightly dishevelled robes. Jaebum chuckles and shakes his head fondly.

Beep! Beep!

“Oh, damn, it’s almost time for me to get to Arithmancy. The time really flew by,” Jaebum blinks down at his watch in surprise.

Jackson throws his head back in a groan. “That was so lame, dude,” he snorts.

“What?” Jaebum blinks in confusion.

“Never mind,” Jackson shakes his head.

Jaebum frowns but decides to let it go. “I guess I’ll see you at dinner,” he says as he hefts his bag onto his shoulder, not making any move to leave yet.

“Yeah, I guess so,” Jackson nods, one hand rubbing the back of his neck.

“It was fun, hanging out with you. We should do it more often,” Jaebum runs a hand down his robes to get rid of the sweat collecting on it. “Maybe something less likely to send either of us back to Madame Jongok?” he shrugs.

“What were you thinking?” Jackson bites his bottom lip, but Jaebum can still see the its corners lifting.

Jaebum shrugs again. “There’s a Hogsmeade weekend coming up soon. We could walk around, go shopping, see what comes up,” he says, just barely suppressing a wince. His words sound stupid and vague even to his own ears, but he’s too nervous to come up with anything better at the moment.

“Yeah, that sounds…cool,” Jackson bounces slightly on the balls of his feet. “Between the two of us I’m sure we could find something to do.”

Jaebum smiles, something loosening in his chest. “Great,” he nods, his feet still stuck to the ground. His watch beeps impatiently. “Well, I better get to class,” he shifts to the heels of his feet, preparing to turn when he sees Jackson’s face fall slightly. Jaebum instead rocks forward, making an impulsively decision that he hopes won’t blow up in his face. It only lasts a few seconds, but his guts swoops and his heart flutters as they did when he was hurling through the air on the back of Jackson’s broom.

“Oh,” Jackson breathes against his lips as they separate.

Jaebum opens his eyes, not knowing when he closed them. The other boy’s pleasantly flushed face makes him lean in again for a more lingering kiss, his arms wrapping around Jackson’s waist as hands comb through his hair.

“I really have to go now,” Jaebum pants, his nose bumping Jackson’s.

“Do you really?” Jaebum in a breath as the other boy presses the entire length of his body against him.

“Well,” Jaebum mumbles, his resolve weakening with each passing second. Jackson pulls away with a grin stretching his cheeks. He grabs Jaebum’s hand and starts pulling him up the staircase. “Where are we going?” Jaebum asks as he tries not to trip over his feet.

“We can’t just make out in the middle of the hallway, but there’s a room around here that we can use,” he calls over his shoulder. “It has exactly what we need.”

Jaebum frowns in confusion, noting that they’re not headed in the direction of either of their dorms. Any lingering concerns about missing class are pushed out of Jaebum’s mind as Jackson squeezes his hand and grins brightly at him.