"I definitely had it here somewhere."
"That is what you said last week. You know Professor Venwiff isn't going to accept the same excuse again."
They were standing in the hallway outside the Muggle Studies classroom; Roxanne with her shit visually buttoned wonkily under her elbow-worn jumper, whilst Othello stood next to her looking as collected as always. It had always been that way and so no one even seemed to notice the pair, especially not the impatient look on Othello's face as he watched Roxanne prop her bag up on one of the window ledges and slowly began to search it.
Pressing her lips together, Rox pulled out various items; broom polish, a skiving snackbox (which Othello frowned at) before finally bringing out the heap of paper suspected to contain her homework. Not in a rush to get to class, Roxanne sighed as she began to trudge through it at a diabolically slow pace. Othello thought he was going to go mad as he watched.
"Just pass me over your bag and I'll look," he said.
Roxanne merely stepped back, letting her friend take over. Leaning back against the wall, she watched as all of her classmates began to walk into class.
"If this bag wasn't in such a mess then you would be able to find it," Othello huffed.
A silence followed as instead of listening to him, Roxanne began to wonder how long Quidditch practice would take tonight. She had promised to meet Molly in the library so Molly could help her work out what to get everyone for Christmas (or rather tell her). She was about to ask Othello what he would like when her friend spoke once more: "Are you sure you even did it?"
"Yes!" Roxanne assured him, "Louis gave me a copy at breakfast."
"So you haven't done it." He wasn't surprised.
"I had quidditch practice and then I had to polish my broom."
"Because an unpolished broom would be the end of the world…" muttered Othello's sarcastic reply.
She didn't even give him the pleasure of a reply.
"Here, I've found it. If Louis is going to go through the effort to do your work for you, and in your handwriting no less, you might have the courtesy to keep it in good shape." He was trying to flatten the creases out of the paper, something he was rather talented at after many a correspondence with the girl before him during the summer. Even her owl seemed incapable of keeping parchment from creasing into a near illegible state.
"But then it wouldn't look like my work."
"It isn't your work."
Taking it from him, Roxanne blew into her cheeks making them as round as possible. Childish expressions Othello was also used to also. He neatly set everything back into her bag then passed it over knowing full well that it was a waste for him to have even tried to tidy its contents; they would be a mess once more by the end of the hour.
"Come on," Othello mused, walking towards the door. "We're going to be late."