Sorry it's taken so long to update – stupid computer troubles like you WOULDN'T believe. I'll try to update about once a week now – we're about halfway through, and if I can update more often, I promise I will.

I really appreciate all the great reviews – you folks are terrific.

Touch the Air Softly

by Jessa L'Rynn

Disclaimer: I do not own these characters. J.K. Rowling created them and writes them with a genius that has never been equaled. Warner Bros. owns the right to do dumb things with them and doubtlessly will once Jo's finished with them, unless she kills them all. I try to fight the urge to put words into other people's visions. But every once in awhile, something yummy like this comes along and I find myself committing what I have been told is both crime and honor. With all due respect to Jo Rowling and her marvelous world, here is my attempt to "steal from the best".

Chapter 8: Lavender's Red

Snape handed an essay to Dumbledore on his way out of Monday's professors' meeting. "I absolutely refuse to deal with this," he said in the most menacing voice he could manage.

Dumbledore looked the paper over and for a split second the twinkle went out of his eyes. "I cannot believe this has never been handled before," he said with evident surprise and passed the paper to McGonagall.

The Gryffindor Head of House turned white and her face grew completely perturbed. "I should have realized, that wretched Muggle," she said sadly. "He's done such a... bewildered job of covering it up, hasn't he, Albus?"

The old wizard twinkled at them both. He smiled in that gentle, concerned, TERRIFYING way of his, the one that left more people cowering in corners than Voldemort at his most menacing. They were quite used to it by now, and only shrunk a little bit. They waited.

"You'll simply have to explain it, Severus," said Dumbledore decisively.

"I'd sooner take poison," Snape offered, and opened his cloak to allow Dumbledore to select from the twenty different varieties he carried with him at any given moment.

"Oh, he can't do it," Minerva snapped. "The experience would traumatize them both."

"I think it should be the responsibility of his Head of House," Snape said silkily.

"It's hardly my place to hold that sort of conversation with a boy," said Minerva in her most rational, haughty tones. "And certainly Hagrid would be unsuitable."

Snape smiled as though he had swallowed a lemon. McGonagall knew he was trying not to say something - probably something rude about Hagrid's background.

"Arthur Weasley?" she suggested.

"On assignment," Dumbledore replied.

This time Snape obviously couldn't help it. "Though he's obviously infinitely qualified to explain the topic," he muttered. She tried not to choke. They went through the names of various male Order members before deciding that they were all either unsuited for the importance of the topic or unavailable.

Snape's pitch black eyes suddenly lit with the insane mirror of the twinkle in Dumbledore's. He looked at McGonagall and she realized what he was thinking in a heart beat. "Why don't you tell him, Albus?" she asked, certain her eyes were now twinkling, too.

Even much later when they talked it over, Severus Snape and Minerva McGonagall were never quite certain how he had gotten out of that one. All they remembered was coming to the conclusion that a book might be necessary and that Ronald Weasley would be the best person to find out if that was the case. Sometimes Dumbledore just had that effect on people.

Ron Weasley had a nightmare mission assigned to him on Tuesday afternoon. He stared at McGonagall blankly and, after trying and failing to think of a suitably flippant reply, he realized that she was serious. "You're kidding?"

"Quite frankly, Mr. Weasley, I'd rather have joked about your Quidditch team, they're certainly funnier. Simply put, there's no one else who can do this, and the question really should have been dealt with sooner. Clearly, by Thursday, a correction will need to be made."

Ron sighed. "I'll just let you know, ok?" he said and, as she nodded curtly, he walked out of the Transfiguration classroom to find Hermione waiting for him. "What was that about?" she asked.

Ron blushed. "Nothing," he said and looked around. "Where's Harry?"

"In the Library," Hermione said, obviously well aware of how extraordinary that pronouncement was.

"What for?" Ron demanded.

Hermione looked a little confused as she said, "He said he had to study for a class on Thursday." She was shifting her bag from hand to hand, looked up at Ron with her expression more worried than usual and said, "I think he's upset about something."

Ron sighed, "I think I know what it is, too," he said and stuck his head back in the door of the Transfiguration classroom. A beautiful blotch tabby was sitting on McGonagall's desk, basking in the sunlight. Ron remembered Hermione telling them that the more an animagus turned into animal form, the more they wanted to do it. "I think you were right, Professor," he said to the cat.

The cat nodded and tilted her head toward a book. Ron walked up to the desk and picked it up, a little blue covered book with random silver designs on the cover. Ron smiled at her and, remembering the cat was his teacher, refrained from patting her on the head.

"What was that about?" Hermione demanded, one hand on her hip, the other full of book bag.

"We gotta give Harry this little book, and that should cure him of his sudden affection for the library."

Hermione opened it, and Ron held his breath. She looked up at him, then, with a broad grin on her face and tears in her eyes. "Oh, that's so sad," she said, and snickered. "I never even thought about it."

Ron slowly started to grin, carefully, hoping that the half-laughing, half-crying Hermione wouldn't suddenly decide on crying and yell at him for being insensitive. "Well, I was afraid she'd make me explain it all."

"Oh, I think McGonagall's got more sense than that," Hermione said. "Ok, so we'll go find him in the library."

"Yeah, and you give him the book."

"No," she snapped, "McGonagall told you to do it, so you do it."

"Hermione, PLEASE," he begged. "You know how he gets when he's mad, and this is really gonna make him mad."

"Not if we pretend like we don't even know what's in the book," she said, smugly.

Ron looked at her carefully. "Oh, yeah, that's sneaky enough for Snape," he said. "You tell him you don't know what it is but McGonagall sent it, and I'll give him the book, and then we run away."

Hermione laughed. "Yes, and then we run away." She reached up and hugged him.

"Five points from Gryffindor, Mr. Weasley," said Snape's foul and evil voice from the end of the corridor. "No snogging in the corridors. It's your second offense, Miss Granger - ten points."

"I hate him," Hermione muttered as they turned away.

"Miss Granger, detention, tonight, six o'clock."

Ron watched, surprised, as Hermione went blank, her eyes going distant and almost as dreamy as his girlfriend's. Weird, he thought. He turned to see what Snape was doing and found the Potions master glaring at her intently. Ron didn't know what to make of it, but didn't like what he was seeing at all. He shook her shoulder and, as soon as her eyes cleared a little, dragged her down the hall. "What was that all about?" he demanded as soon as they were in the secret passageway and well away from Snape's prying eyes.

"What?" she asked, sounding quite shaky.

"Snape gave you a detention and you zonked out," Ron said. "What's the matter with you?"

"He gave me a detention and I've got so much homework, I was just trying to keep from yelling at him." She ran a quivering hand through her bushy hair and smiled up at him. Ron knew her habits now well enough to realize that there wasn't something quite true about it - she had probably been going to cry again.

"C'mon," Ron said. "We'll get this book to the library and then get dinner so you can make your detention on time. Greasy bat."

They walked into the library and found Harry slumped over a book, avoiding Ginny who was sitting across from him trying to catch his eye and ask him what was wrong. Ron had a brief insane set of visions of what she would say if she found out. None of them were particularly images he wanted in his head.

"McGonagallsentyouabook," Ron said, as fast as he could. He prepared to make a run for it, but Harry caught him with his eyes, looking frantic and embarrassed and really, really angry. "She said it's a book about stuff," Ron added, more slowly this time.

"Stuff?" Harry asked, his face turning red and then pale.

"Yes," said Hermione in her most pleading and gentle tones. "Something about muggleborns not having the information," she said and pulled an identical book out of her own bag. "She said I needed one for something, too," she added as she put the book away.

"We don't know what's in yours," Ron added, "but I hope it helps you study."

Harry narrowed his eyes at them and studied them carefully. They smiled innocently and reassuringly back at him. Nothing embarrassing, Ron thought, nothing that a best mate wouldn't do for a best mate, go on, quit being all scared and just say thanks so we can run away.

"Thanks," Harry muttered and put the little book under the other book.

Ron turned toward the door. "C'mon, Ginny," said Ron, "come down to dinner with us so we can talk about the thing with the thing and the, er..."

"Stuff," said Hermione brightly, catching Ginny's arm. Harry didn't even look up.

"Where'd you get the book, Hermione?" Ron asked her.

"Glamour on my Transfiguration book," she said. "I thought it might make him argue less." She shook her head and sighed.

Ron laughed, not because it was funny, but because of how embarrassing it was to everyone.

"What was in that book?" Ginny whispered, even though they were down in the entry hall before she asked.

Ron sighed. "Something you and mum talked about last summer and Dad and me talked about a few years ago," he said.

"Nobody bothered to tell Harry," Hermione said, in a sad and angry voice.

Ginny grinned broadly. "I would have," she said cheekily.

Hermione rolled her eyes. "Tell, not show. Tell."

"Urgh," said Ron. He could hardly believe this had happened. They taught him everything about Defense Against the Dark Arts, showed him things no one his age should have to know. The Boy-Who-Lived and would have been a perfect spy had always had ways of finding out things that no one ever wanted him to know. But no one had thought about something that everyone expected him to know and no one planned to tell him. If it hadn't been for his terrible circumstances, he probably would have picked it up by now, but no one really talked about simple things like that in front of him. The boys used to joke about things like this, but only in the ignorant terms of half-knowledgeable little boys who really didn't have anything to base their theories on – used to. Now, they only talked about the war, and Voldemort, and the Death Eaters. And so, at 17, Harry Potter was upstairs in the library learning where babies came from.

Let me know what you think and I'll try to update as fast as I can.