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03. stars
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Regulus Black was strange.
Ivy can remember thinking that in her second year.
She had been sitting at one of the round tables in one of the narrow rows of the library. The young girl had her head buried in a book from the Astronomy section of the library— a rather large and confusing section to sift through as a twelve year old. Of course, Madam Pince was not much help to the girl as the librarian had shushed her as soon as she opened her mouth.
However, the woman had taken out her wand and swished it, sending Ivy into a nearby chair and reeling her to the front of a specific section— Astronomy.
Ivy's once tense shoulders sagged in relief when she realized.
She'd struggled in Astronomy since her first year. She had been excited to learn about the stars, the sky, the moon and the planets. She'd always had a fascination with the stars. It stemmed from the belief that her father was one of them. She believed he watches over her every night.
But, that excitement soon died out when she realized how much work actually went into the subject. It wasn't knowing the names of the planets , but also knowing the names of their moons and the environments of planets and locations. It wasn't about knowing why the stars were so bright or how many there were, but memorizing the constellation they belonged to and their names.
None of which had the name of her father's.
She concluded that she no longer liked the stars.
Twelve year old Ivy, once again, had tears in her eyes as her quill snapped with her attempt of drawing a constellation. She had wasted so much parchment and so much ink that she was tempted to just set fire to the assignment all together.
And she was going to.
She held her wand out and pointed the tip at the mess of her work station, muttering an incantation when the sound of a book being dropped onto the wooden table had her stopping and looking up in shock.
There stood a boy with dark hair— the darkest she was sure she'd ever seen— and his grey eyes, the eyes that had a greenish hue against slate, squinted down at her pathetic scribble of the Boötes constellation. The constellation that his star, Regulus, belonged to.
He was offended.
The thirteen year old boy slumped down in the chair across from Ivy and he stared at her.
That was all he did.
For two minutes and thirty two seconds, Regulus Black blankly stared at Ivy Bardot's face, waiting for her to move away or say something.
