Their professor made her way down the aisle, returning submitted scrolls to a mix of reluctant and impatient fingertips. Some students merely opened up what little they could to see their mark before turning to the person seated next to or behind them, mumbling strings of surprise, expectation, or utter dismay. Remus, too, sat with both brows lifted and his chin tilted slightly inward while gnawing on his bottom lip and tapping his foot as McGonagall approached him and James.

"Well done, Lupin, Potter," she said simply, victory nowhere laced within the applause. It did, however, make it a lot easier for Remus to sit forward, stretching his scroll far and wide, quicker than most, to track down the O inked in its corner.

"How'd you do?" James asked almost robotically, his eyes firmly planted on his own exam.

"O."

"A— Wait, what'd you say?"

"I got an O," he repeated, tilting the scroll in his hand ever so slightly towards James who leaned forward in his seat, pushing his glasses further up the bridge of his nose.

"No way," James mumbled, squinting at the circle. "No one gets an O on Transfiguration theory— not in this bloody class. How'd you manage an O?"

"I, I don't know," Remus admitted, both of them openly staring at one another. He lifted both his hands out, parchment include, to lift his shoulders in a slow shrug as James' body collapsed to the back of his chair. "I suppose, I mean…" His words trailed off just as his thoughts did.

James' reaction was not unwarranted. While it was possible to achieve an O on practical Transfiguration exams, on exams concerning theory— it was almost better left for mythology. Rumor had it that to achieve an O on theory would entail being McGongall herself, and even then. Remus scratched his temple, glancing over the others who were shoving their exams deep into the depths of their bags, most likely to never be seen again.

All except for one.

She had not even bothered to open the scroll, instead leaving it to sit there, threatening to roll off the wooden table top and onto the floor only to be stepped and stomped on once the bell rang.

He watched out of the corner of his eye as his parchment left his side of the table to be thoroughly analyzed by James. But his thoughts no longer concerned the exam, and instead, they lingered on the untouched scroll next to the witch's hand and what was hidden inside it.

Remus could not help but feel the desire to investigate it himself as if it was his own exam sitting at the edge of the table. He would have hoped that from her behavior, he could have gotten some sort of hint as to how it had gone— but why wasn't she opening up the bloody scroll?

Eve Kavanagh.

Despite the few times he had felt like ripping his hair from his scalp, coupled with the fact that she never seemed to acknowledge or greet him in the corridors when they passed one another, the last few memories he had with her had left a peculiar impression on him. For weeks, he had been met with so much resistance, but after their stroll in the woods, it wasn't that Eve had become easier to tutor, per se, but she had granted some authority to him. In an odd way, to say the least. She had stopped asking him why he was there, why he cared, and overall her once suspicious take on him had pretty much disappeared.

He, too, with time, had learned to be careful where he stepped. If there was something she was not able to do, he had learned not to fight her on it. Even though it still ached him as to why, it was now pushed to the back burner. He had opted and taken the liberty of creating a variety of plans to suit what she would and would not be able to do on a particular day. There was no point in forcing her to admit to something that she had already decided was not his to know. Apart from that, she would do what she could and always made sure to be on time, if not early. Most of the hours were spent in silence. Remus would complete his own set of tasks while she did hers, and their conversations were limited to her work. It was in those brief moments that he had taken note of the way she listened to him when he provided feedback.

She had never once objected to him pointing out her mistakes or faults, instead sitting silently, watching either his hands or face, and absorbing every word he said. When he finished, she would thank him and edit what he had pointed out. It was gentle, in essence. Both in the way she would react and in the way he would speak. There was no word to really describe those moments beside gentle.

The bell rang and they all collectively gathered their belongings. Remus put his things away and took back his exam from James' clutches. Behind him, he could hear Aphrodite Flint's voice float further into the distance as she chewed away at how loudly Melisende Gamp snored. It forced him to glance up at the now empty table where she had been sitting with Eve.

Except the scroll was still there.

Did she leave it on purpose? he wondered, pausing to examine it as his brows furrowed. Why not just toss it?

"He got a bloody O," James' voice interrupted his thoughts as Sirius stood with the two of them. Peter bickered over the exam with Mary MacDonald, making his exit of the classroom without so much as look at the three of them. "Where are you going?" Remus walked forward to the abandoned scroll, and unsure whether the question had been directed to him or Peter, he grabbed it and lifted it up to his friends. "What's that?"

"Kavanagh's exam," he responded in a low voice as he returned to their sides.

"And you're taking it?" Sirius asked, looking to James and then back to Remus.

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Because she just left it."

"The fuck's it got to do with you?"

"I tutor her," Remus reminded him, slipping the scroll into the sides of his bag.

"But how do you know it's hers?"

"Because she was sitting there— she always sits there."

"You were watching her?"

"Briefly," Remus admitted albeit the words coming out slowly as his glance moved between the two of them. "Why? Is that a crime?"

"No, it's—"

"I have to go over this exam with her," Remus cut him off sharply. "We've been working for weeks on this exam. I put in a lot of time and effort to make sure she passed it. So, yeah, excuse me for showing interest in my own efforts."

"He's got a point," James commented.

"For weeks?" Sirius repeated.

"Yes," Remus breathed while flicking his gaze upwards then back to Sirius.

"That's how he got an O, you bloody idiot." This time, however, his derision was directed at James.

Remus stilled, the realization dawning on him. It hadn't occurred to him that the sessions with Eve were the reason behind the unprecedented success of his own exam. Sirius had questioned it loud and clear— all they had been able to do was theory work. Eve's inability to conjure a spell had forced both him and her to theory and theory only. He had memorized it all for, what he had once believed, her sake— but now realized that it was because of her that he had achieved an impossible.

"Right, yeah, makes sense," James noted, leading their way out of the room. "Bloody hell, maybe I should tutor somebody."

Remus was still lost in his thoughts as Sirius and James explored the possibilities and intricacies of James tutoring somebody, somehow the conversation ended up somewhere along the lines of Quidditch, but that it would make no sense since James was already the star Quidditch player at Hogwarts, so there was little — if any — improvement needed in that arena. The statement had caused Remus to roll his eyes, but it had gone unnoticed since neither one of them was paying him much attention.

As they turned, Remus found Eve waiting outside the fifth-floor girls' bathroom. Her shoulder pressed against the stone wall and her arms crossed over her stomach, eyes cloudy and staring off into the distance. Unmoving, as if someone had permanently petrified her and placed her about the castle, positioning her as they liked, when they liked.

He had gotten used to it.

"Kavanagh," he greeted, a toothless smile on his face as Eve's blank stare moved to the corner of her eye and fell on him. Sirius and James had only taken note of their friend's pause when they heard the witch's surname, but Remus made a gesture with his head for them to continue on without him. James responded with a quick thumbs up, placing a hand on Sirius' shoulder, and pulling him along to continue.

"You left this." Remus turned his attention back to the witch, reaching for the wrapped scroll sticking out of the leather bag. Eve glanced down at the paper held out between them.

"I left it?" It had been too low for him to make it out. The witch fixated on the scroll. To her, it looked nothing but empty. There was nothing on it that indicated it was hers. There were no words, no writing, not even a stamp. It was just a rolled-up piece of parchment that someone held out to her, but they were giving it to her with the certainty that it was hers to take, so she took it without further questioning.

Eve wrapped her fingers around the scroll only to bring it back into the clutch of her crossed arms, refocusing her gaze on the distance.

"You— do you, would you want to take a look?"

"At what?"

"At the exam?" He cocked his head and scanned her slack face as she shifted slightly toward him.

"Exam?" It was as if the exchange that had occurred mere seconds before had flown completely over her head.

"In your hands, that," Remus specified, his eyes dropping to the scroll in her hand. She followed his line of sight and lifted the exam so that it was at eye level with her. "The Transfiguration exam?"

Of course, that's what McGonagall had been handing out in class.

When their professor made the announcement that she would be returning their exams at the end of class, her morning dose of Dawdle Draught was at its peak. Though it had begun to wane as it neared the end of class, Eve had assumed the roll of parchment that was in front of hers had to be Aphrodite's, and so she had paid it little mind as they collected their things to leave.

"You do remember it, yeah?"

"Yes," she responded with a deep breath.

"If you're nervous about the mark," Remus misinterpreted, lowering his voice. "I can take a look at it first, with your permission, and I'll go over it. Whatever it is, we'll work on it."

"Okay," she submitted a bit too easily, loosening her grip on the scroll. Remus hesitated, watching her push the parchment back over to him. He hadn't exactly meant now, at that exact moment, but he supposed there was no reason to protest, either. There was no where he had to be.

He took back the scroll and played with the edges of the parchment to unroll it— his own heart beating faster than when he had unrolled his own exam. The initial response was a sequence of slow blinks, followed by a dropping mouth and rising brows.

"Exceeds Expectations," he announced, looking up at Eve. Her eyes lit up for the briefest of seconds, her head going straight as her gaze darted from Remus to the exam.

How the fuck did Eve Kavanagh manage an EE and James an A?

"This is a great mark! You did really well! That was not an easy exam." It was almost as if he was trying to convince her, or maybe himself, that she really had attained what was written on that scroll.

Eve's posture stiffened, constraining the same overwhelming wonder to nothing but stalled breaths. She couldn't even remember what had been on the exam. If Remus were to ask her a single question written on that paper, she would come up empty-handed.

What Eve could recall is the vicious cycle that the loophole had become, though it was working in her favor. It had been a matter of trial and error, but she had found a way to master some dominion over the crystal that Alexander Sykes had given her. She could do what was placed in front of her— it did not stop her heart from racing nor did it stop the shaking, or the fact that it would keep her up for hours unless she double-dosed on Dawdle Draught. Again, vicious cycle. So, what Remus' astonishment lacked was the knowledge that her success was not one of sober efforts. It was a result of Eve locking herself in a bathroom stall, licking the side of the rock, waiting for the dust to settle on her tongue without swallowing, and then walking into the Transfiguration room to write that exam.

And shit, did she have a lot to fucking write while tied down in that chair.

Yet, it had been the pressing and relentless efforts of the Gryffindor wizard that had truly gotten her life to take some sort of shape again. There was no amount of Dawdle Draught or grey crystal that would have incentivized her enough to go back to day one of Transfiguration and repeat everything anew. Eve could not imagine a more dull or daunting task, and Remus had been more than willing to pursue it.

All for her sake.

"Well, you did it. Are you happy?" Remus handed the open parchment back to her which she took, catching a glimpse of the EE written on the top before it sloppily rolled itself back up. A frown and a slight crease did not go unnoticed by him, and he leaned back as she remained concentrated on the paper.

"Thank you," she finally said, both sharing a look. It was earnest, in her voice and on her face. A corner of Remus' lips lifted, a small shrug lifting his shoulders.

"It was nothing."

If only.

"Eve," a third voice announced.

Both of their attentions attached to Aphrodite Flint, who now stood in the bathroom's doorway. Her eyes moved between Remus and Eve, then back to Remus with one brow raised. The wizard pursed his lips, taking a step back and shoving his hands into his pockets as the unfamiliar presence turned the oddly warm encounter cold. "Yes, Richard?" Aphrodite jibed with a slipping, forced smile that made her seem more like a starved dog in front of a pile of free meat.

"Remus," Eve amended without so much as a flinch. Aphrodite's expression slackened as she looked to her friend, and Remus' eyes darted from Eve to Aphrodite and back to Eve in the same time it would take a snitch to bat its wings once.

"I know," Aphrodite replied, playfully swatting at the witch as a short laugh left her. "I knew that, silly. It's just that's what we…." but her words faltered as Eve's unblinking gaze bore into hers. "That's what we call him."

"We?" Eve asked, the blank tone freezing Aphrodite from the inside out, her breaths caught in her own throat.

Aphrodite would not know that Eve had no intention of punishing her nor was this a slap of superiority. It was because her mind was in shambles, and she truly had no idea what Aphrodite was referring to. All she knew was what was in front of her: that the witch standing to her left was Aphrodite Flint, and the wizard standing to her right was Remus Lupin. She could not recall a Richard nor that it was her younger self's fault that Aphrodite had just misnamed him as such. Eve's reality was only what was in that moment, anything beyond or before that was too far gone. Some parts had disappeared entirely with time, her curse, and the Dawdle Draught's help to expedite it.

"That's Remus Lupin," Eve repeated as she took in Aphrodite's dazed stare. The witch's posture fell, her shoulders sinking as she reclined into the doorway.

"Sorry," Aphrodite muttered quickly to Remus. "And why's he here?"

"He's helping me."

"Helping you?"

"Yes."

They stood in awkward silence for a handful of seconds as Remus took in the scene that had just occurred.

He had just stepped into the game.

The same game that, as of late, increasingly took up more space in his thoughts than he would like to admit. The same one he had drawn up theories of, and even rankings of, while he was left to his own devices during meals, classes, and even in the common room when James would begin to talk about Quidditch. Quidditch-talk always triggered his newfound fascination with the game. The idea of the game had become so utterly alluring to him, and yet he was too embarrassed to share his pondering with anyone, for he had assumed that the game could not possibly exist outside of his own imagination.

But Remus had been observing the game ever since McGonagall had told him that he would be overseeing Eve's performance in Transfiguration. There were times when the reality of the game did not seem so contained to his fantasy, like when James had pointed out the strikingly quick development between Moira Palancher and Alexander Sykes. Yet, it did still seem a bit ridiculous. Now, in its immediate presence, he realized just how real it was. And to top it all off, never had he considered that he, too, would become a part of the game. No, Eve had just so clearly demonstrated the game to him: among the three of them, there were two teams, and Eve had called him to her side — the victors — while Aphrodite Flint stood without medal or trophy.

Now, Remus wished he really could go to the common room and blurt out his game theory to the others. The tips of his fingers tingled, and he had to bite back a bark of laughter as his eyes continued to move between the two of them.

The game.

It was real— and it was one worthy of watching. Eve's position in it, so often hidden, so often a secret left in the dungeons, came to light, adding another dimension to his theories.

Remus was not a manic obsessor— but the Slytherin dynamic was intense. With a combination of past, recent, and also unexpected findings and observations, he had had some fun putting them all in order of who was where, who held what position over who, and what moves they had to play to get there in the first place.

The top of the rank was hard to sort. He had yet to figure it out, though he did consider some qualifying contenders. Further rumination had led him to believe that first place was an ever-changing rank— a constant battle between two people. He knew, though, that there had to be someone who made the final call, or else the game did not make sense. What would be the point of it, then?

"Right, Lupin," Aphrodite interrupted his thoughts. The two strangers looked upon one another yet again. "We need to get going, did you manage to do—"

"No, I mean, yes, I just…" but Remus was still at a loss for words over something that was rather, or should have been, insignificant. "Kavanagh, uh." He glanced quickly over at the witch who had returned to staring at the emptiness of the corridor behind him. "She dropped her exam when you two, when you two left Transfiguration, and I, well, I thought it best to return it to her."

"I see," Aphrodite noted, peering at the scroll in Eve's hand. "Well, that's done, then, yeah?"

"Yeah— yes," he agreed, nodding once.

"Great!" Aphrodite threw him the same dog-like smile from before and wrapped her arm into Eve's, but Eve pushed the witch away ever so slightly and leaned back against the wall without so much as looking at her.

"No," Eve told her. Aphrodite's chin flinched inwards as the command's reverberation took its place. "You go."

"But—"

But she didn't need so much as anything else except the apathetic, somewhat fatigued, look that Eve had thrown her to know there was going to be no further questioning of the matter.

"Okay," was all Aphrodite mumbled before departing alone to her next destination. Eve closed her eyes and leaned her head against the stone in much the same position he had found her in.

"Is she gone?" The question broke the silence. As if expecting it, Remus kept his eyes on Aphrodite, nodding slowly as he refocused on Eve.

"Yeah."

"Good," Eve sighed, keeping her eyes closed as if she was preparing for sleep. Remus, finally with the liberty to do so, let the laugh that had threatened to escape him moments ago release itself. It forced Eve's attention on him. "What?"

"That was unbelievable," he admitted, shaking his head while laughing. "I mean— I've never, I feel bad for her."

"Don't," Eve assured him. "She hasn't left me alone since the time we woke."

"Yeah, but…" Remus tilted his head back, a beaming grin still plastered to his face. "Come on, her loyalty is something to be admired."

"Loyalty?" She posed, an eyebrow lifting. "You call that loyalty?"

His grin dropped to something of a smile as he considered it.

"What else would it be? She was damn near about to cry when you told her to go."

"I'm just her shield."

"Does she see it that way?"

"Of course," Eve affirmed. "She's not as slow as everyone thinks her to be."

"I didn't call her slow."

"No," she agreed. "But don't fool yourself into thinking Flint's loyalties lie with me. Her loyalties are to herself and her own survival. She will be loyal to me as long as I serve my purpose, the moment I don't, well…"

The game— again, and he was putting the pieces together with every word that came out of the witch's mouth.

"Right, the classic Slytherin friendship, you mean?" Remus egged on, a smirk lining his lips as he looked down at Eve.

"You could call it that."

"Merlin." He rubbed a hand over his face. "I feel bad for the lot of you. I can't believe I do, though."

"Don't feel bad for the choices others make for themselves." He didn't have an immediate response— she was right, what business of his was it to feel any sort of way or to think anything of the way they positioned themselves to one another.

Maybe it wasn't so much them that he felt bad for.

"No, I just," he shrugged, putting together his thoughts, "I suppose everyone's a circumstance of the context they grew up in." Remus watched her carefully, and she was listening. It seemed almost as if it was not confined to just his feedback, but that she liked to listen to him. And it was not as if she hadn't just shooed Aphrodite away while permitting Remus to remain.

The day, which had been just an ordinary day, was really turning into something of a novel.

"It's just a bit like I had said before, to experience friendship, real friendship— it's something, I don't know, special."

"In love with your friends?" His initial response was a paused breath, but there had been an obvious lightness in her tone that made him release it.

"I wouldn't say I'm in love with them," he played back, though his own caution exceeding hers. "They're okay."

"You're always talking about friends and friendship," she articulated.

"Not always."

"It's not the first time you mention it, though."

He couldn't believe how much she was talking about something other than Transfiguration. Or, at least, how much she was talking to him about something other than Transfiguration.

On the other hand, Eve was thoroughly amused with everything that had unraveled. She was amused with Remus' confidence to stop and return the forgotten exam in the middle of the corridor; she was amused with how they had somehow managed to turn the tables so that — at least — McGonagall would get off her back; she was amused in general with Remus Lupin. He had become something of an interest of hers, especially when she was running high on crystal and he was somewhere in the vicinity. Though her curiosities did not delve nearly as deep as his did. They were much more fleeting, limited to things like his smoking habit, how he only wore muggle clothes the first chance he got, and how he seemed to call everyone by their first name.

Well, at least, he wasn't Aphrodite Flint.

"No, I suppose it's not," he admitted. "It's just they've helped me a lot, so… It's, yeah— I owe them quite a bit." He watched as a smirk lined her lips and something of satisfactory smugness brightened her stare. He realized almost immediately where he had messed up. "Not in the sense— it's not like that."

"But it is, isn't it?"

Something about the simple string of words made his stomach quiver. The brief silence that ensued told Eve she had hit something hard— and finally the tables had actually turned in her favor in every way she would want them to be.

She lifted off the wall and straightened herself into a perfect posture.

"Where are we supposed to be?"

Remus lifted his brows.

"Am I supposed to know your schedule?" He nearly snorted. "I didn't realize that was a part of my duties, too."

"What time is it?" Eve sighed as if the real question she had meant to ask had been so obvious in the first one. He flicked his wrist to reveal his watch.

"Still an hour before lunch," he informed her. "So, unless you're enrolled in a non-N.E.W.T.s elective, I reckon you have nowhere to be."

"Are you enrolled in a non-N.E.W.T.s elective?"

"Yeah, just not today," he answered.

"Not today," she repeated, the words lingering on her still-smirking lips. "Then we can stand here and chat for the next hour."

"Actually?" Remus' head bowed down, unsure whether it was now his turn to be shooed away like a pestering pigeon. "Is that what you— is that really what you want to do or?"

"No, but I can't be bothered to go anywhere that Rosier will be able to find me. I may lock myself in one of these stalls here until lunch."

"I'm sure Rosier will be at lunch," Remus pointed out.

"Precisely—"

"Yeah, so…"

"Precisely where I will not be."

"What? Why not?" They both looked at one another, and Eve couldn't help but realize that the waning draught was making her drunker with speech rather than perturbed of it.

"I can not," she began but shut her mouth. "The options are minimal."

"You don't like what they serve for lunch?"

Eve took one step closer to Remus, and despite sitting next to her during their tutoring sessions, he had never seen her willingly approach him so closely.

"Evan has been on me since the beginning of term," was all she said before looking down the corridor both ways as if the person she spoke of was somewhere to be found.

"I thought you said you don't speak?"

"We don't— we weren't, not really," she repeated, in brief, the same story he had heard only days ago. "But he's watching me, again, I know that much."

And that's why he had seen her sitting next to Evan Rosier in the most confusing seating arrangement that the history of Hogwarts had ever seen.

"Watching you?"

"Yes," Eve whispered quickly.

"Can't you just…" The silent look Eve gave him was enough to answer his question. It almost sent a shiver down his spine as he began to wonder just how far the control Evan held over Eve went— and how much and to what lengths he would go now that he was older and more capable to wield that control.

He, too, wondered what had changed in their dynamic but she had already told him that her guess would be as good as his— and it wouldn't be a good one at all.

"Eve," Remus began in a low tone. "If he tries, I mean…" He couldn't meet her gaze. "If he hurts you in any way, just… Just let me know, okay?"

"And what will you do?" She inquired, beginning to laugh. "Gryffindors."

"I'm also a prefect," he reminded her— but honestly, he doubted detention would do much of anything to moor the Slytherin wizard. What he could do would be beyond his jurisdiction of prefect, something that had not been in his plans at all.

Eve's laughter and quick comment about him being a Gryffindor were not as fruitless as she had made it seem. Sure, being a Gryffindor did not mean that Gryffindors were running around with a savior complex trying to mend even the tiniest cracks in the walls, but there was a reason why those houses existed in the way that they did; and yes, one of those reasons did include the need to rip Evan Rosier's head off for depriving someone not only of their identity but also of sustenance.

"Or tell someone, at least."

"I'll be fine. It's just lunch. Not like something bad will happen if I don't go."

"No, you'll just starve," he retorted.

"I'll figure something out," she assured him, swatting her hand.

"I suppose, yeah, you could just go the kitchens."

"To the what?"

"The kitchens," Remus repeated. She stared at him as if he was speaking in a different language. "You didn't— you don't know that you can, you can just go to the kitchens and get…" He lifted his chin, realizing that she didn't know.

This was going far beyond what Remus could have ever imagined.

It entailed that for the last couple of months, there were times she had simply foregone having meals to avoid the likes of Evan Rosier. With every passing moment, Remus was just about ready to grab his friends by their collars and figure out a way to make Evan Rosier cry for his mother without getting them all expelled for it.

And it would also explain at least a part of his musings— Eve not showing up to meals, Eve shaking, Eve not being able to pay attention in class.

Just how hungry was the witch?

Eve, on the other hand, had found that her loophole worked just fine to keep the hunger at bay. Matter of fact, the first signs of hunger were what signaled the substance's life was coming to an end and it was time for a re-dose. Of course, she knew she had to eat something to keep herself standing because, otherwise, that would simply be too much for anyone to handle, and these were the moments when Aphrodite Flint acted as her shield.

Aphrodite Flint, despite her efforts, could not gamble as well as Melisende Gamp or Rosalia Selwyn. Firstly, it had to do for the utmost superficial reason that she was not as attractive as Rosalia, and, secondly, she could not muster the same threatening cruelty of Melisende Gamp. The latter who had a leg up also for her position as prefect. As such, it was often Alexander Sykes, who now sat with Moira Palancher and the newest and oddest addition that Eve had yet to figure out how and why— sixth-year Sophia Blanchet, that Aphrodite Flint found herself dining with.

And, luckily, Alexander Sykes — despite his odd mannerisms — was still the purest of the pure, so while Evan Rosier would never willingly sit next to him and have a meal with the wizard, he would respect their configuration.

Moira Palancher, aided by being highly favored by Regulus Black, came from a pureblood family that commanded various posts around the Caribbean. In terms of wealth, no one at Hogwarts could come close to the expansiveness of the Palancher vaults— of which the true size was of constant contemplation as most of it sat on the other end of the world. And yet, Moira had not grown up in British pureblood society, so her differences were profound both in her physical attributes and in her behavior.

Nonetheless, the contradictions that came with slighting the purest and the wealthiest of their House helped Eve to maintain a distance from Evan without retribution.

These moments, however, were usually mornings when Aphrodite was most likely to be with Eve. On other days, it would depend on their class schedules. Dinner was damn near impossible most of the time unless she managed to find Aphrodite in their dorms before.

As she had told Remus earlier: survival.

"We're going to the kitchens," Remus stated.

"What?"

"You just said you're not going to lunch," he recapped. "And you didn't know you could just go to the kitchens, so we're going now. I'm going to show you how it's done so you can," he shook his head again and glanced upwards, "at least have an option."

Eve pursed her lips, not because she was uneasy about the proposal, but because he was going beyond just proposing it.

"You can just tell me," she told him. "You don't have to waste your time."

"I'm not wasting time," he said, looking at her. "I'm obviously going to eat something, too."

"Yes, but you'll be eating with me."

"Wow," he responded, feigning a show of shock on his face. "Fuck, really?"

"What?"

"What do you mean what? You make it sound like you're the worst person to eat with."

"I can imagine you could find better company," she specified. "Or would at least want to spend it with your friends."

He almost wanted to tell her that she was his friend. Even if he knew little of her, he couldn't help but feel as if through all the fuss and fighting, she had allowed him to see something of herself that she had kept hidden from everyone else. That alone had to sum up to something. She just didn't or wouldn't believe him if he actually said it, he knew that. And even if they weren't friends, so what? Sure, maybe there was better company, and maybe this would turn out to be one of the worst lunches he had ever had, but what alternative had she really left him with?

Remus knew that her admissions of Evan Rosier were not a ploy to get him to sympathize— but that's what made it worse. She didn't even feel sorry for herself which meant that she had yet to fully grasp the damnation of it all.

"I spend plenty of time with them," he assured her, shrugging. "Besides, we'll go now, and I can still make it to lunch."

"You're going to eat twice?"

"Yeah," he said easily with a silly but somewhat false smile. "I like to eat." They stood in silence but the draught drew weaker and the hunger stronger, and the pangs that came with it were more apparent. It wouldn't be long until she fell flat on her face.

She supposed, in a way, she also owed him after the success of the exam.

Yes, that would do it. It was reason enough to spend a few extra minutes with the wizard. Because Eve was conditioned to believe that her willingness to spend time with Remus was a gift to him. In her fucked up, pureblood-molded supremacist mentality, she truly believed she was doing him the favor of having lunch together.

Remus would not finish that puzzle, either. For him, and despite all the help he had already extended to her, this was just another thing he had to help her with.

The perplexing collision of their worlds, and the rationality of the irrationality.

"Okay, lead the way, then," she told him, lifting her hand to the left of the corridor.

"Right," he instructed, and she began to move towards the left. "No, I actually meant, as in— like the direction, it's this way."

Author's note: this chapter was meant to include other stories, but it ended up being 16,000 words so I divided it into two separate chapters. Warning, while this chapter is only Remus/Eve, the next one is not really going to touch upon them much at all.

Again, I am sorry for those of you who continue to read while I update this story in the most sporadic way. I know sometimes months pass before a new chapter is up. I love this story so much and it has grown so much in my head. I am committed to finishing it, hopefully by the end of this year. The next chapter should be up quite soon since it was supposed to be posted with this one.

All the best, M.