UNFINISHED VERSION

1.13

Violet ran from the quidditch pitch up to her dorm, stumbling over the seam of the doorframe on her way. She was red faced, extremely sweaty, and completely out of breath, "Lily," she huffed, "I have a question."

Green eyes glanced up at the brunette, an eyebrow raised and arms crossed over her chest, waiting for whatever stupid question would greet her.

"What does one bring to study?"

The redhead had to take a moment, making sure her friend was being serious. A large grin appeared on her face, "You're actually going to study?" the brunette nodded, still hunched over and trying to even her breathing. 

Lily jumped around, clapping softly, "This is amazing! I'm so excited! Ok, ok, so, what you'll need is your books, notes, some parchment-" she listed, pulling out all of her own supplies as she spoke.

At the rustling Violet looked up at her friend, heavy guilt resting in her stomach. "Lily..." Violet spoke up softly, meeting the excited emerald green eyes, only adding to the weight in her stomach. Violet began fiddling with her hands, "I was already going to be studying with someone else..."

She expected the redhead to deflate. For Lily to be upset that she couldn't help her younger friend.

"Oh." Lily shrugged, "Yeah, I know" she spoke absently, continuing to gather her things in a pile, "Adam Mallory told me earlier. He was upset someone offered their help before he could" she rolled her eyes at the boy. 

Lily picked up one final book before turning around and extending the pile toward Violet, "I just take better notes than you."

——

It was 8:30 when Violet made it to the library,"Sorry I'm-" she looked around at the tables, all of which were empty, "late."

Violet sighed, closing her eyes. When she finally reopened them, she was still met with the dark, quiet, abandoned library. Now she felt horrible. Someone was actually willing to help her, but her tardiness caused them to give up and leave. Great.

She walked up to one of the tables in the middle of the large room, placing her -well, Lily's- books down. She was already in the room at this point, might as well try to do the work. It would be harder by herself, but that was her own fault.

Violet walked over to face one of the hundreds of tall, large, and very full bookshelves. She had forgotten how truly daunting they were, so many words, so many titles, so very many words. Where do you even start?

It felt like an eternity that she spent sifting through several sections, all of which, seemed to be on potion making. How was she going to find help in these stupid books if she couldn't even find the subject she needed?

Then, she noticed something moving in the distance, over against the wall. In the dimness of the library, a single light could be seen flickering beyond the corner.

Violet patted her sides for her wand, no way was she investigating whatever that could be  without some form of protection. 

When doing so, she was quickly reminded she was still in her quidditch jersey due to the damp sides of the shirt. There were no pockets in the jerseys. No place for a wand. 'Great job Vi, way to go on that one.' 

Instead, Violet picked up one of the large hardbacks to her right, before slowly making her way down the aisle. It wouldn't do as much as her wand could, but it definitely be more helpful than nothing.

There, crammed in between two of the dustiest book shelves she'd ever seen, was a small beat up wooden table pressed to the wall. Upon it were a few book stacks carefully placed on the table and neatly stacked papers with elegant curly writing upon them, small sketches of the creatures gracing the margins. 

It was all so organized, easily rivaling Lily's organization and her detailed notes. 

The small flame from the candle in the center of it all was the only light in the library, somehow managing to cover the entirety of the little nook, casting soft shadows over the sharp features of the boy sitting there.

Noting the new presence, Regulus looked over the cover of his book, finding the disheveled Potter with her jaw dropped wide.

It took everything in him not to smile, instead he coaxed it into a smirk, "Ah, so you can read." his head tilting, grey eyes quickly scanning the title, "However, I was under the impression we'd be studying Defense Against the Dark Arts, not" he scoffed —it was more like a snort which he played off as a scoff... because snorting, of course, was not proper— "not- muggle anatomy."

Yes- a muggle's anatomy was the same as a witch or wizards, this book was just written by a wizard about muggles in the days far before modern medicines. To give you a quick idea of how the book was written, the author hailed from the days when medicine was explained by the four humors and leaches fixed everything.

Violet blushed deep, shoving the book onto the shelf closest to her, "Sorry" she spoke, scratching the back of her neck, "I got here late and then spent the rest of that time assuming I was the only one here-"

"You didn't think it wise to check?" he spoke, causing the girl to somehow blush even deeper. "We can begin now, if you would like."

Violets eyes widened, "Oh- no, no, no, you don't have to, I- it's already late, you can leave, I already made you wait too long."

"I know I can leave, but that doesn't mean I will." shock painted her face at his words, "As I mentioned earlier, your marks? Criminal."

"You're- you're still helping?" he nodded once, "but, it's practically nine already and it's going to be a long night." he only nodded once more, "I don't want you to loose hours of sleep because you chose to help me hours ago-"

"Potter." he cut her off, one of his almost invisible smiles on his face. The candle light and harsh shadows betrayed him, accentuating the grin so few got to witness, "Don't worry about it." He gestured down to the empty chair across him.

Violet pointed back in the direction of most of the tables which sat in the front of the library, "All my stuff-"

"No matter," Regulus pulled a small stack of parchment from under the table, followed by an inkwell, "I've already gathered all we need."

--- 

It took several tries, lots of patience, and many hours, but eventually Regulus was able to help Violet complete her paper by three in the morning. 

He had to redirect the girl's attention back to the work at hand more times than she would ever admit and a pile of random objects that she'd gotten distracted with were thrown haphazardly behind him. By the end, the candle was close to burning out, the neat piles were no longer as uniform as they began, and ink stains covered both of the teenagers arms. 

Regulus was now finding himself getting distracted. 

Every once in a while, he would catch himself looking at the girl while he was supposed to be cleaning up. She snored softly laying over an open book, head rested on her elbow, and a quill in her grasp. Violet had fallen asleep around a paragraph or so from the end of the assignment while Regulus had been reading an excerpt from a textbook aloud to her, and he couldn't make himself wake her to finish it. 

So, he took it upon himself to finish off the last few paragraphs, she'd worked hard on all other seven and a half pages, he couldn't see why it would be an issue to give her the final closing pieces needed to meet the requirements. 

Hopefully Professor Brisbane wouldn't actually end up reading the entire thing, and would just give her the credit for scraping together the eight parchments.  Not to discount Violet's effort of course, her writing was phenomenal and well thought out given the circumstances. The boy just hoped that the Professor wouldn't be looking too closely.

That the man would end up missing the point near the end, where Violet Potter's messy scrawl  merged into Regulus Black's neat and refined cursive.

Yeah... I definitely had to write this since I spent all last chapter teeing it up.