She was... short. And skinny; not skinny as in 'delicately curvy' but skinny as in 'no tits whatsoever'. Her hair was dark brown, almost black, in a fat, kinky braid, and she had over-large gray-green eyes that made her look like she was staring. The Hufflepuff badge on her robes was just the cherry of Boring on a big sundae of Average. If he could have, Sirius would have turned around and pretended he hadn't seen her.
But she was still standing there with her hand out, waiting for him to hand over the book. "May I please have it back?" she asked. "It belonged to my grandmother."
Something in Sirius was tempted to say 'finders, keepers', but if he did, she might tell one of the professors he'd stolen the book... and worse, she might think he actuallyread this mushy crap. So he pulled it out again and shoved it into her hands. "Here," he said. "I was going to give it to the lost and found anyway."
She almost snatched it and held it against her chest as if hugging it. "Thank you," she said.
"Uh... you're welcome," said Sirius. And then, because she seemed to expect something else, he added, "you should put your name in it or something. So if you lose it again, people will know who to give it back to."
She nodded. "Probably, yeah... I just sort of think of it as Grandma's, not mine. She used to read to me from it when I was little."
Sirius looked the girl over again; short, skinny, sallow, big-eyed, and sentimental... and the Room of Requirement was trying to set him up with her? Like hell. Still, something in him couldn't resist asking, "do you have a date for the Graduation Ball?"
Her eyes opened even wider. "No," she said slowly, her face confused. "Do you?"
"Of course I do," he replied quickly.
"Then why did you ask?" she wanted to know.
"Just curious," said Sirius. He shrugged and dug into his bag for a textbook. "Enjoy your poems," he said, burying his face in arithmancy. The girl didn't reply, and when Sirius risked a glance up, a few seconds later, he found she was gone. He exhaled, relieved - now if only his luck held, maybe nobody had noticed him talking to her.
But of course one person had - Remus Lupin. "Who was that?" he asked, peering at Sirius over the top of his textbook.
"Nobody," Sirius replied, meaning it.
"Nobody you almost asked to the ball," Remus pointed out.
"No, I didn't," said Sirius. "I had no intention of asking her to anything. I don't even know her name. I'm just... seeing what's likely to be left, in case we can't get the triplets back." That sounded rather lame even to Sirius, and when he looked up at Remus' face, he found that his friend appeared to be thinking the exact same thing. "Can I ask you a question?" said Sirius.
Remus shrugged. "Sure."
"When you said we could try the Room of Requirement looking for dates, what exactly did you expect us to find in there?"
"Not books of poetry, if that's what you mean," said Remus. Damn him and his apparent ability to read Sirius' mind! "I don't know, it was mostly a joke, really. Why do you ask?"
"Just curious," said Sirius, although he knew damn well that Remus knewexactly what he'd done. "Don't tell James, okay?"
"I won't," promised Remus. "The girl's name is Rosalie Cranmer, if you wanted to know."
Sirius was about to say that he hadn't, when a heavy book bound in pink leather dropped onto the table, startling him and Remus both and nearly upsetting Remus' inkwell.
"Here we go!" announced James, brushing off his hands. "Love Potions; Foundations and Variations for the Advanced Student. There ought to be something useful in here!" He sat down, cracked it open, and began to flip through the pages.
Sirius exchanged a glance with Remus, then shook his head and looked down at his own textbook again. The sound of laughter at a nearby table made him look up, though, and when he did he saw Rosalie Cranmer sitting with some friends, who were all giggling madly about some private joke. Great, just great... she'd probably just told them about how Sirius Black, one of Hogwarts' Big Men on Campus, had asked her if she had a date.
He was never, ever going to live this down, was he?
---
Remus often wondered if Sirius realized just how transparent he was sometimes. Only a fool could possibly have heard him ask about the Room of Requirement right after his conversation with poor Rosalie and not have figured out where he'd found that book. Remus might have promised not to tell James, but it was a pretty good bet that James would find out anyway... Sirius would do or say something that would make it obvious.
Although even if he figured it out, James might not believe it... even Remus hadn't quite been certain until Sirius had admitted it by asking him not to tell. Remus had, as he'd said, suggested the Room of Requirement mostly in jest, and actually trying it seemed like a very un-Sirius-like thing to do. Sirius and James both had far too much pride to lower themselves to such a thing.
But it seemed Sirius had looked indeed, and found Rosalie's book of poetry. That seemed like a strange thing for the Room to offer him, and made Remus wonder exactly what had been on Sirius' mind when he opened the door. The Room of Requirement had always intrigued Remus - James and Sirius always said that how things like that worked didn't really matter just so long as they did, but Remus liked to know. What was wrong, after all, with wanting to know just so he'd know?
It was with that in mind that Remus decided to go check it out for himself. He doubted he'd have much more success than Sirius - even if the Roomdid get him a date, it wouldn't be one James and Sirius would approve of - but he wanted to see what it would give him.
But like Sirius, he wasn't about to go at a time when his friends might find out where he was. He waited until after dinner, and then made the excuse that he'd left a book in the library so he could go and take a look without anybody suspecting.
After using it for animagus practice for years, the Marauders knew the location of the Room of Requirement by heart. Remus paused outside for a moment to fix in his mind that he needed a date for the Graduation Ball, then opened the door.
Inside, the Room was a library. Sunset light was coming in through tall stained-glass windows, illuminating rows of bookcases. At the far end from the door was a huge stone fireplace with a bear rug on the floor in front of it, and sitting cross-legged on the rug was a girl with her back to the door.
Remus stood still, not sure what to do next. But he had to do something, so he cleared his throat. "Um... hello?" he asked.
The girl glanced back, then scrambled to her feet. She was wearing a Ravenclaw uniform, and had limp, dishwater-blonde hair that fell in eyes hidden behind huge eyeglasses. Remus didn't recognize her - she wasn't in any of his classes. Perhaps she was in a younger year. Whoever she was, she looked terrified.
"Sorry," he said quickly, holding up his hands. "I didn't mean to scare you."
She relaxed a little. "It's okay," she said. "You just startled me. I've never seen anybody else in here before."
"Neither have I," said Remus. "I thought my friends and I were the only ones who knew about it." He bit his lip. "Do you want me to leave?"
The girl looked like she wanted to say yes, but then she shrugged. "No," she said. "It's not like this is my private library or anything." She sat down again. "I can't tell you not to use it."
Remus shut the door behind him. "Well, technically," he said, "itis your private library. This is the Room of Requirement," he explained. "It becomes whatever you need it to be."
"Ohhhh!" she said, as if that suddenly cleared up a big mystery - and apparently it did. "You know, I kept telling my friends there was another library in the school, and none of them could ever find it! Even Professor Flitwick told me I had to be mistaken! I just ran across it one day when I wanted somewhere to study alone." She looked around at the bookshelves. "It's usually something different when you use it?"
"My friends and I have been using it to practice transfiguration when we didn't want to be interrupted," replied Remus. "Or sometimes to hide from the Custodian when we don't want to get in trouble."
The girl smiled.
"What's your name?" Remus asked her.
"Vivian Calibourne," she extended a hand.
Remus took it and gave it a gentle shake. "Remus Lupin," he replied. "Nice to meet you."