maple syrup | remus lupin [1]

20. crossing paths

MADAM POMFREY HAD run out of the potion for the flu that had been spreading around the castle. That meant that Claudia, who had eventually gotten ill from her friends, had to recover in the normal Muggle-way; she had to rest.

So, for about a week Claudia had been a moody brat to say the least. Her friends were rather sick of her, and in all honesty she was as well. But, eventually she recovered and was back to normal; which meant that she was also back to being a person her friends actually could stand.

Then, it was Remus' turn to be ill. He was, after all, a werewolf; and the full moon was approaching.

He was in pain, there was no denying on that. He tried getting through class that Monday, but he eventually gave up and then he spent the rest of the day in bed; sleeping and staring at the ceiling. He was bored. Not even his friends helped, so they were gone getting food for him in an attempt at cheering him up a bit.

Remus, however, had an idea. It might have been a stupid one, but he wanted a book. He wanted one of Claudia's books.

She had finished "Jane Eyre" when she was ill, and Remus had already finished that one short after. After that Claudia was to busy with revising, so she hadn't gotten another book.

Remus figured there was a large possibility that she had read some other book on that dusty shelf of Muggle-books, so he left to the library. The walk was slow and painful, but he wanted to read badly so he didn't care.

At the same time as Remus slowly and surely walked to the library, Claudia was doing the same in a more jolly and excited rate. It was time for another book, and that always brought a smile to her face no matter what. It wasn't often that her smiles were that genuine.

She entered the library only to see a little girl, a Hufflepuff, standing in front of Madam Pince with a book that she was returning. A Muggle-book, that Claudia had read last year.

"Shit," she whispered as she saw how the librarian picked up her wand and began checking the book.

It was very rare of other students to read Muggle books. That was why Claudia felt so safe doing what she did, but seeing an eleven year old little girl being so close to getting in trouble was something that trapped the girl in guilt. So, she started walking towards the librarian in order to take the blame, only for the strangest thing to happen.

Madam Pince checked the pages, closed the book and gave the girl a small nod, indicating to her that she could leave.

Claudia's eyebrow knitted together closely as she realised that her books were most likely safe from whatever spell Pince would use to make sure the book hadn't been cluttered on.

She couldn't see Claudia's annotations, and she also didn't seem to notice that Claudia had removed all her protective spells so that she could annotate them in the first place.