IT IS QUIET IN THE HOSPITAL WING, where Jo sits, posture pin straight and bloodied hands knit together over her lap at the end of Dorcas's hospital bed, across from a cross-legged, cross-armed Marlene. Jo figures that soon enough, Snape will have run his mouth to whatever professor he could find, and McGonagall will be storming down to grab her by the ear and give her a scolding like no other. But for now, she sits, uncomfortable in every sense of the word, watching and waiting for life to return to Dorcas's face.

Her knuckles are raw, red, leaking blood that drips down the lengths of her fingers and dries before they reach the tips. It would be easy enough for her to clean it, heal, but there's something about the throbbing and the swelling and the bleeding that makes her feel grounded, distracts her from the way Dorcas sleeps still in front of her, from the way Marlene's gaze keeps shifting back to her. So Jo watches the blood, and she bites down on her tongue until she can taste it.

Regulus is waiting for her, just out the door, a little down the hall. Jo thinks about that more than she should be. She thinks of him, twiddling his thumbs and watching the door, waiting for her. She thinks of herself in his eyes, with bleeding knuckles and wild eyes and a wand pointed at McNair. At Dolohov. At Reed. She thinks of reversed knees and foul Blugers and broken noses and wonders, with a burning shame in her gut, what that must look like in Regulus's eyes.

Her eyes flash back to Dorcas, though, and it's gone in an instant, replaced by the flare that fueled her in the first place.

"She really regrets it, you know."

Jo's head shoots up at Marlene's voice. It's been a while since she's heard it, so low and loud and smooth and thick with confidence. She forgot what it was like and is so focused on it that Jo misses the words that they form. "What?" she questions.

Marlene blinks at her, face scrubbed clean of makeup; puffy and flushed red from crying and rubbing and crying and rubbing again. Her eyes are wide and blue, and they stare straight through Jo. "Dorcas," she clarifies, sniffles, swallows, clears her throat. Jo thinks she might cry again. Her voice gets thicker. "She really regrets having it out on you. Cries about it all the time."

She doesn't know what to do with that. She lets the words sit on her lap and she stares down at her hands again, nail picking off the dried scales of blood. "Oh."

"She was really scared that you would judge her for going out with me," Marlene continues, eyes trailing on the ground now, like she's speaking to herself, like she's trying not to cry. "Not because I'm me, but because I'm a girl. Got defensive, said a lot of stuff she didn't mean."

"I don't care that she's got a thing for girls," Jo says, voice rough, run raw from the yelling. "I'd march down the streets of London shouting my support to the rooftops if that's what she wanted."

"How's she meant to know that?" Marlene counters at once, tilting her jaw up at Jo.

Jo is quick to answer. "Because I'm her best mate," she insists, edge in her tone now, "and I've always supported her and I've always protected her."

And it's true. Jo knows it's true. From the moment they spoke, Jo has always looked out for Dorcas. Stuck her neck out for her. Stepped in front of curses for her. Spit venom at anyone who crossed her. And now she's split her knuckles on Snape's face for her.

Marlene adjusts, wiggling in her seat and crossing her arms over her chest. "Jo, I like you," she starts, "but, as far as I'm aware, you fancy blokes, and you're a pureblood. A very rich one at that. You and Dorcas live very different lives and have had very different experiences. You can't blame her for being anxious, especially not when she found out before she was ready," Marlene tells her, words sure and confident and coming out easy but hitting Jo hard.

The blood has stopped coming from her knuckles and it has dried all over her hands. It crackles and flakes and Jo inhales deeply, knowing that Marlene is right and knowing that it's been true the whole time, but she's just been too stupid or hotheaded or caught up in what Dorcas yelled at her to realize it. She feels unbelievably thick.

Marlene eyes her for a moment, checking for a response she won't get before she goes on. "Now, did she go about it the right way? No. She knows that. But you've got to cut her some slack. You'll never know what it's like to live through what she lives through."

It isn't until she opens her mouth to speak again that Jo realizes that she's fighting off tears. "I've wanted to talk to her the whole time. Just never knew what to say."

"Funny," Marlene says with a dry chuckle, "that's exactly what she said to me about you."

Despite herself, Jo smirks. "And what'd your tell her?"

"I told her that it didn't really matter," she answers, and Jo feels her gut twist up, "saying anything is better than saying nothing."

Jo thinks of the way Regulus laid his fingers on hers, how the chill of them tightened her throat, set her hairs on edge, remembers his slight twitch of a smirk, his hushed voice, for her ears only. "Yeah, I've been told that as well."

A beat of silence passes, Marlene still squirming and shifting, before she says, "And Jo. I really am sorry for earlier in the year."

She shrugs. "It's alright. My father always says I hold a grudge a bit too well."

"Better than folding over for everyone who's ever wronged you," Marlene replies. "Honestly, it's a quality I admire about you."

"Potter!" The shrill voice of McGonagall echoes through the high ceilings of the hospital wing, and Jo is, at once, filled with dread.

She pushes to her feet. "Suppose that's my queue."

Marlene gives her a soft smile. "I'll tell Dorcas you were here."

"Thanks, McKinnon."

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Regulus is on her mind a lot. He normally is, but now it's becoming a problem.

She's never been particularly interested in Quidditch beyond her own involvement in it, and even then she hardly cares. But now she sits in the stands, attention rapt, ignoring the inquisitive looks from her brother and watching as he flies across the pitch.

He's graceful, which shouldn't come as a shock to her, but it does. He is graceful and elegant in everything that he does, and he flies like it is an art. None of the clunky, rough movements that come from her. Nothing about it is boastful or robust, like the arrogance with which her brother flies, but it is smooth and delicate, like a dance. She's transfixed as he slices through the air on the hunt for the Snitch.

And even though it is cold, the early March air sharp and fierce, Jo is happy to be there, watching him, like she always does.

From her right, Peter pokes her ribs with his elbow and leans into her side, "Alright Jo, who've you got?" he questions, and Jo can swear she hears the jingling of Galleons in his pocket.

Jo snickers, and answers without looking away from Regulus, who is buzzing about the opposite side of the pitch. "James'll have my head for saying this," she starts, "but I'd really rather Slytherin win this one."

James is, at once, riled up. He leans over Sirius, and gives his sister a harsh, scandalized gaze. It is a parody of the expression he gave her when he saw Regulus drape his fingers on her shoulder, whisper in her ear. Her gut rolls. "Blasphemy," he laments, "From my own blood as well. Josie, you've cut me deep for the last time. I'm disowning you, you belong to Wormy now."

"Would you piss off?" Jo scoffs, rolling her eyes and returning her attention back to the pitch, eyes looking to catch Regulus once more. Bright flashes of yellow rush past them, and there is a hum in the crowd. "I'm only saying that because I'd rather rip out my own teeth than play against Reed again," she says, and then turns to face Sirius on her left. "Do you think all exes hate each other as much as we do?"

Sirius pauses, tilts his head and bits of his hair fall out from behind his ear, dangle by his chin. Jo wonders what Regulus would look like with long hair like his brother's. "In my experience, yes. But it's usually one-sided, and it's the girls hating me."

Jo thinks of Emmeline, who was beaming as she told Jo of her dreamy date with Sirius. She gives him a sour smile. "That's because you're a pig and you treat girls like doormats."

"Ouch," he says, placing a hand over his chest and slumping, head lopping to the side, onto Jo's shoulder and she rolls her eyes at his dramatics, "another scathing critique from Little Potter. What have I ever done to you?"

James leans in closer again as Sirius sits back up. "Maybe it's Josie that'd done something wrong, and she's projecting," he suggests, not looking at Sirius and not looking away from Jo. He raises an eyebrow at her, smirking.

Her brother has been uncharacteristically minding his business, and that in and of itself is making Jo's skin crawl. James has not said a word about Regulus, not said a word about the way he touched her, or about the way he spoke to her. She wants to throttle him. "Me?" Jo questions, feigning innocence. "Do something wrong? Impossible. I'm basically a saint."

Peter snickers. "Saint Potter," he chuckles. "What exactly would you be the saint of, Jo? Unspeakable violence?"

"Backwards knees?" James suggests.

"Broken noses?"

"Bloodthirsty vengeance?"

Jo grinds down on her teeth. "I'll break all your noses as well if you don't quit it."

Sirius tosses an arm over Jo's shoulder and pulls her close into his side, holding her too close and squeezing her too tight. She squirms under his grip. "Little Potter, I've really got to say, there has never been a moment in my life where I was prouder of you than when I heard you broke Snivelly's nose," he praises as she worms out from under his grip, her hair now sticking straight up with static from rubbing against his coat. "It truly did make my heart soar and would've given anything to have seen it."

Jo doesn't bother with a response, she's too busy trying to flatten out her mess of hair. "It was actually a bit horrifying," James notes. "I'm actually starting to think you might be a harpy in disguise, and my real sister's off locked in a cave somewhere."

It is now Peter who wrestles Jo into an embrace, tugging her close to his side and Jo doesn't bother fighting it off. Her hair is already ruined enough. "Are you scared of your little sister, Prongs? Your tiny baby sister"

James eyes her like she is something foreign. "The stolen one in a cave? No. The beast that sits before me? Yes."

Jo pushes off of Peter and straightens up. "So dramatic."

It seems that Regulus has spotted the Snitch, as his flying patterns have switched. He is now in a deep dive, plummeting towards the ground at a rate that makes Jo tense. And she doesn't know why she leans closer in her seat, why she curls her fingers into the center of her palm as he gets lower and lower to the ground. She doesn't know why she relaxes when he straightens out, flying smooth and straight, arm extended towards the Snitch. She doesn't know why she has to bite back the cheer in her throat when he wraps his long fingers around it.

But she knows why James's eyes are heavy on her.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Jo shovels her breakfast into her face like she hasn't eaten for days, enjoying the taste of it on her tongue. The bags under her eyes feel lighter than they have. Her limbs feel less like concrete. She feels more human. In her classes, she pays attention. She takes notes fervently and even asks a question or two of her professors. She jokes with her gaggle of first years as they follow her from class to class, teasing and telling stories and smirking whenever her words make them giggle. She tells all of her friends that Dorcas is meant to be released from the hospital wing today, finally, after three long days. She smiles for no reason. She feels light. And as she walks through the corridors of the dungeon towards Potions, prepared to arrive to class early, her sight is robbed from her.

At first, there is nothing but panic. Her chest closes in on itself. She hears a shout, hears an explosion of laughter, feels the sting of a curse on her back. Almost immediately, she sinks to the ground for no other reason than to feel the safety of it. Because where there was just dimly lit corridors and dusty air and slumbering portraits, there is now nothing, heavy blackness. So sudden and so abrupt. Her heart beats in her throat, her hands are pressed down hard against the tile of the floor.

She breathes heavily. She inhales harshly and exhales quickly. There are people around, that much she is sure of. Jo can hear them. Through the blackness, she can hear them. There is whispering and murmuring, and she is sure there is laughter and all at once Jo knows what happened.

It must have been very satisfying for them, for Snape or whichever one of his Death Eater friends did this to her, to see Jo like that as she sits on the ground, unstable breathing, unseeing eyes wide with panic. And Jo thinks, as she sits there with panic making it harder and harder to get air into her lungs, that the abrupt loss of sense will not leave her vulnerable. She swallows, hand tight around her wand, and she listens.

She hears laughter. She hears jeers in vaguely familiar voices, maybe Rosier. Maybe McNair. Maybe Dolohov. They're nasally and sharp and Jo bites her tongue, squeezes her eyes shut so the darkness will feel familiar. "Not so scary are you, now Potter?" the voices call out to her. "That's what you get for fighting like a muggle, you fucking blood traitor!"

And Jo just sits there, knees against her chest, arms holding them tight. She says nothing. She bites on her tongue, and she chokes down her humiliation and her rage and she sits there until the laughter and the taunts fade, until their footsteps get further and further away, and Jo prays that, whoever finds her like that, blinded and curled up into herself, it's not Regulus.

But of course, it is.

She hears his footsteps first. They are slow, and then they rush, heels echoing against the ground as he rushes. Jo knows it's him when he says her name, Josephine. He's the only one who ever calls her that, he's the only one who ever says it like that, tenderly, with such an unusual care. It falls from his lips like it's a question, and then again, closer, tangled up with his footsteps, more urgently.

He drops to his knees beside her. That she feels. His knees slam into her shins as he slides in next to her, and she shudders when his hands reach up her arms, one on each side, soft and unsure. "Josephine," he says again, and Jo realizes her eyes are still squeezed shut. "What's going on? What's happened?"

It takes a great effort for her to answer, to form the words. Her chest is tight, throat tighter. Her voice is strained when she does find the words. "I can't see," she tells him, fighting over control over how she sounds, how she emotes.

Regulus is quick to work his arms around her. He pulls her up off the ground, up onto her feet, keeping a long arm over her shoulders to steer her. "It's okay," he whispers as he adjusts, voice a higher octave than it usually is, "I'll get you to Pomfrey, and it'll be alright. It'll be alright, Josephine. You'll be alright."

And he does. Regulus keeps Jo tucked under his side and, step by step, he guides her away from the dungeons, up to the Hospital Wing. Jo is dizzy and flushed and even though he is cold against her she feels like she is burning with heat.

He tells her where to step. He tells her when to inhale, when to exhale. He tells her that it'll be alright. He tells her this a lot. Regulus tells her this so much she is beginning to wonder who he is saying it for.

And after he deposits her neatly on a hospital bed, he stays. He stays when Pomfrey tends to her and he stays as she panics and when the world is revealed to Jo once more, he is there. Regulus is the first thing she sees.

He is in a chair, pulled up closely to her side as she blinks her sight back. It comes back little by little, at first it is colors, then they blend into shapes. She can make out the curl of his hair, the cold green of his eyes. And as he comes into focus, she can see the downturn of his pouted lips, the clench of his jaw. Jo sits up, flushed with embarrassment, and says, "I'm sorry."

What she expects from Regulus is his usual gentleness, his sage wisdom, his soft words. You have nothing to be sorry for. You don't have to be sorry for needing help. But what she gets is cutting, sharp words that sound like they don't belong to him, not to the Regulus she's grown to know. "Who did this to you?" he demands, cupping his chin in his hand, staring hard at the ground.

The question shocks Jo. Or perhaps not the question, but with the intensity in which it was spoken. It was spat out through gritted teeth, left at her feet like something rotten. Jo searches his expression for something, but Regulus has become stone once more, coldness locked into place. She, for a moment, stumbles. "Erm, I, I dun-I didn't see. I dunno."

Regulus flashes his eyes towards her, and Jo feels a chill go down her spine. "I'll find out, and they'll never do anything like this to you again. No one will."

The words make her dizzy again. She sits up straighter, looks around and pushes down some feeling that she can't place. "Is, is there anyone here right now? Is anyone else-"

"It's just Pomfrey," Regulus cuts her off, and Jo turns her head back towards him. "No one else is here."

Jo nods, head feeling heavy, and she lets herself sink back into the bed just a little more, suddenly aware of how harshly her head is pounding. "I'm sorry you had to," she starts, but doesn't know how to finish. She shakes her head, hoping to knock out any lingering thoughts of embarrassment.

Regulus smiles now, soft and forced, and once more, his hand has found its place on her forearm, thumb trailing back and forth against the fabric of her robes. "It's what we do, right?" Regulus asks, and Jo looks up at him with wet eyes. "We look out for each other."

Every part of Jo is buzzing. "Yeah, we look out for each other."

Another smile from him, wider, realer. "I know you say Meadowes is your best friend, " Regulus says in a low, hushed voice, but Jo hears every word, "but I think you're mine. I think you're the only real friend I have. And I don't want to see anything bad happen to you again."

Jo can't explain the way her heart feels like it's going to beat out of her throat when Regulus says that to her, when he looks at her with that sweet smile and lowered eyes, but she feels choked up when says, "I think you're one of my best friends too."