Shades of Grey

Morals

“Liam, spare me one minute of your time.” Aurora pled, placing her hand on his arm that night as they set off to patrol the corridors. He sighed and turned to face her, his expression unreadable.

“Aurora…” He tried to stop her but she wouldn’t hear it.

“She knows we’re together right now, anyway. She can’t be upset.” She pointed out. She could see how Emma might get upset, honestly. It wasn’t as though Liam hadn’t betrayed her trust before.

“Aurora, I’m sorry. It’s just better if we don’t do this right now.” He sounded exasperated. She crossed her arms over her chest.

“I’m not giving up that easily, Liam. You know how I am.”

“I didn’t say you had to give up; I was just saying that I already had.” He left her standing there with the hurt growing inside of her chest. It had never occurred to her that Liam might be angry with her for acting the way she did. Perhaps it was immature of her to have run away like that, to have panicked, but what else was she to do in that situation? Ask him to sit down and have a little chat about why that was not okay?

“I got lost again.” A small voice rang out clear through the corridors. Aurora broke her train of thought long enough to see Rosalind standing there, staring blankly ahead.

“I’m sure you did.” She sighed. Rosalind didn’t answer her. Aurora was too deep in her thoughts at the moment to even think about giving her any sort of punishment. She was far past caring.

“Want to walk with me to finish my duties? I’ll walk you back to the Ravenclaw common room afterwards.” Aurora offered. Rosalind nodded and took her hand. Aurora couldn’t help but stare for a moment, wondering why Rosalind was so childlike all of the sudden. Was she really that innocent?

After performing her rounds, Aurora walked Rosalind back to the Ravenclaw common room. Before they had a chance to even hear the riddle the door would pose to them, it swung open, revealing Emma.

“Emma, hey.” Aurora greeted her, managing a smile.

“Rosalind, pet, I can’t believe you’re still getting lost. You’ve been here for six months.” Emma sighed and shook her head. Rosalind merely shrugged her shoulders and disappeared into the common room.

“Are you busy right now?” Emma asked.

“I mean, I should get back to my room…” Aurora began to say, but Emma cut her off.

“Could we hang out for a bit, maybe?”

“Sure.” Aurora wasn’t sure why she agreed. Honestly, if she were caught roaming the halls after her duties, she would be in trouble. Emma led the way up the stairs to her dormitory, sitting down crossed-legged on her bed.

“Emma, are you mad at me?” Aurora asked, eliciting a blank look from Emma.

“No; why would you think that?” Emma asked as though nothing had happened at all. Aurora shook her head. It wasn’t worth starting anything.

“Just wanted to make sure.”

“How did you do on the essay Lupin handed us back today?” Emma asked conversationally.

“Pretty well. I spent all weekend working on it.” Aurora laughed nervously. Emma nodded.

“Perks of dating our professor, huh?” Emma asked in a low voice. Aurora’s eyes widened.

“He wouldn’t do that, Emma.”

“Of course not.” She smiled. Aurora hadn’t even thought about that; is that what people would think? That she did well in his class because of their relationship? Maybe if she did poorly in other classes, but she’d always managed high marks.