Prelude to The Potter and Weasley Kids Do Hogwarts
(I've added this to help with setting in coming chapters – sorry it's been so long!! And thank you for wanting more!!)
Déjà vu
Infuriated that best friend Scorpius Malfoy has asked a girl to the End of Owls Ball because they're 'fit', Rose Weasley decides to make him jealous by telling him she, too, has a date. The problem? She lied. Whilst trying to come up with a solution to this, her mum Hermione tells her of a rather interesting and scarily similar experience she had when she was in her fourth year at Hogwarts…
Instant Messaging Key:
Lol Laugh out loud
Lmao Laughing my ase off
Soz Sorry
Comp Computer
W8 Wait
SM06 I think I'm gonna ask Sarah Brown, cus she got fit over da summer
Rose Weasley stared at the computer screen in front of her incredulously.
Scorpius Malfoy, one of her best friends, was going to ask Sarah Brown to the End of Owls Ball, despite the fact that he had a girl only too willing to accompany him; it hadn't even crossed his mind to ask Rose!
And, even worse, the only reason he wanted to ask Sarah was not because he knew her well or admired her intelligence; no, it was because she was 'fit'.
Annoyed, Rose sat up straighter in her chair and began to type a response.
magicrules06 Oh, right. U guys in da same classes, then??
She pressed the Enter key and sat back to wait for an answer, knowing full well that it would be 'No'.
SMO6 Nah. But she's in Slytherin, so I've spoken 2 her a couple of times
Reading this, Rose simultaneously felt her blood boil and run cold.
So that was it.
Despite all his assurances that he was nothing like his father, and that blood-status and house-ties meant nothing to him, Scorpius Malfoy would still rather take a Slytherin to the Ball than a lowly, half-blood Gryffindor.
"I c," she typed back coldly, stabbing at the keys. "Well, gd luck wiv that."
She pressed Enter again and watched the bottom of the conversation box carefully.
As she had hoped, Scorpius, who normally responded to messages quickly, due to the fact that he would be using a pay-by-the-hour computer because his father flat-out refused to own anything 'so very Muggle', did not start typing a response immediately.
After almost a minute (a long time in the world of Instant Messaging), a message flashed up at the bottom of screen, telling Rose that Scorpius was typing a reply.
SM06 R u alright?
Rose began to write back a sarcastic response but something made her stop.
She was mad at Scorpius, it was true, and wanted to show him so, but perhaps revenge, not contempt, was the best form of medicine?
Yes, she thought, a smile forming on her face, let's make payback a Brilliant Indication To Crushed Hope.
Erasing the answer she'd started with, Rose replaced it with:
magicrules06 Yeh, I'm fine, lol. Just hoping u 2 won't upstage me and my partner, lmao!
Smirking, Rose watched the bottom of the screen again, imagining Scorpius' expression as he read her reply.
He replied surprisingly quickly:
SM06 Uv got a d8?? Who wiv?? How come u didn't tell me?!
"Gotcha," muttered Rose, her smirk replaced by a grin.
"O, soz, I gotta go – Hugo wants the comp," she improvised, knowing this would infuriate Scorpius.
He responded immediately.
SM06 W8!!
magicrules06 Spk 2 u soon!!
SM06 U haven't told me who ur goin wiv!
magicrules06 Byexxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
SM06 Rose, w8!!
magicrules06 has signed out
Stretching in her computer chair, Rose's feeling of satisfaction suddenly seeped away.
Sitting bolt upright, she realised she had one major flaw to her brilliant get-back plan: she didn't have a mystery date.
Sighing, she stood up and walked across to her bedroom door.
Opening it, she padded down the hall, rolling her eyes as she heard the banging and yells of "Yeah, take that, Potter!" and "Screw you, Weasley!", coming from her brother Hugo's room, and made her way downstairs and into the kitchen, where she set about making herself a hot chocolate.
Just as she'd popped her drink into the microwave, the back-door opened and her mum, Hermione, walked in, clutching a basket full of freshly-dried clothes.
"Mum, I've got a problem," said Rose, without preamble.
"What kind of problem?" asked Hermione, setting the basket down on the work-top and pinching a couple of marshmallows Rose had found to put on her hot chocolate.
"Boy problems," said Rose, imitating her mum.
"Ah," said Hermione, pulling out the ironing board and setting it up, "The best sort."
"I'm going to assume you're being sarcastic," grumbled Rose, walking over to the microwave as the buzzer went off.
"So what kind of boy-trouble do you have, Rose Weasley?" enquired Hermione, as she ironed a pair of Hugo's school robes.
"The kind where your best friend doesn't ask you to the Ball because someone else is more 'fit'."
To Rose's great surprise, her mum let out an incredulous laugh.
"What?" she asked, feeling slightly wounded.
Noticing her daughter's stony expression, Hermione clarified hastily, "Sorry, Rose, I wasn't laughing at you. It's just that I never thought I'd hear of someone with as little tact as your father!"
"What do you mean?" frowned Rose, squirting whipped cream artfully on top of her now steaming drink.
Hermione smiled.
"I never told you, did I, about the Yule Ball your father, Harry, Ginny and I attended when we, aside from Ginny, were in our fourth year at Hogwarts?"
Rose shook her head and took a sip of her hot chocolate, intrigued.
Her family, especially her parents and Uncle Harry and Aunt Ginny, rarely shared gems from their school days – more from never having been asked, rather than not wanting to.
Rose knew her parents and aunt and uncle had been famous during their school days, and although her brother and cousin James did not hold any particular interest in how and why this was, Rose and James' younger brother and sister, Albus and Lily, were fascinated by it all.
The three of them wanted to know everything they could about their parents' lives as teenagers– after all, the History books only documented what had been witnessed, not the things that had happened away from the rest of the world.
"No, you haven't," said Rose, sitting down at the kitchen table. "What happened?"
"Well," said Hermione, folding up Hugo's robes and placing them in another basket labelled 'Hugh', "As you probably remember, our fourth year bought with it the ill-fated Triwizard Tournament. Part of the tradition of it was to hold a ball. Your dad and Harry, being the idiots that they are, weren't exactly inundated with offers-"
Hermione paused.
"Actually, no, that's a lie – Harry was, being a champion and all. Your dad on the other hand…"
Rose watched as a smirk appeared on her mum's face.
"Let's just say that he didn't leave all that much to be desired. Not until our sixth year, anyway."
Hermione's expression darkened as she remembered back to the days of Won-Won and Lavender.
Rose, realising her mum was becoming side-tracked, said pointedly, "So, who did Dad ask? You?"
Hermione snorted.
"Don't be silly. He didn't notice me until all the 'good-looking ones' were taken and Neville had ask me to go with him-"
Rose squealed.
"Leanne's dad asked you to go with him?"
"That's right," nodded Hermione.
"Professor Longbottom wanted to be your partner?" giggled Rose.
"Rose!" admonished Hermione, fighting to sound stern. "You know Neville, he's a family friend, don't be rude!"
"Whatever, mum, it's still weird," said Rose, shaking her head. "So you went with Neville instead of dad?"
Hermione smiled again.
"Well, no. Unfortunately, I'd already been asked by someone else."
"Really?" said Rose with interest, taking another sip of her drink as she tried to fight off the mental image of her mum and Neville slow-dancing. "Who by?"
"Viktor Krum."
The mental-image vanished as Rose's brain was flooded by this astonishing information.
"No way!" she squealed, staring at her mum disbelievingly. "No way did Viktor Krum ask you the Yule Ball!"
"Well, that's really how Viktor and I got to know each other," smiled Hermione, marvelling at how much excitement this simple revelation had elicited. "Suffice it to say, your father wasn't very happy when he found out."
"I'll bet," grinned Rose, now imagining how red her father would have gone when he saw her mum gripping the arm of the world-renowned seeker. "What did he do?"
"Called me a traitor and refused to speak to me for the rest of the evening, aside from having a huge argument in the common room," laughed Hermione, shaking her head. "I told him if he had such a problem with it, then next time there was a ball, he should ask me before someone else did."
"And what did he say to that?"
"Well, I'd stormed off by that point, but according to Harry, he just stood there spluttering about how I'd 'missed the point'."
"But it was because he liked you, right?" said Rose, wondering if Scorpius would ever like her enough to get that mad.
"Of course," nodded Hermione. "Not that he would ever have admitted it. You know, I've always wondered what spurred him into realising he had feelings for me…"
"Well, you weren't exactly forthcoming either, if what Ginny's told me is true," said Rose snidely.
Hermione threw a sock at her.
Throwing it back, Rose confessed, "I told Scorpius I had a date."
"And do you?" asked Hermione.
"No," Rose admitted.
"Well, why did you tell him that you do, then?"
Rose shrugged.
"To make him jealous, I suppose."
Hermione raised her eyebrows.
"I thought you two were just friends?"
"We are!" said Rose hurriedly. "I just thought he'd want to go with me, because we're best friends, that's all."
Hermione nodded sympathetically, pretending to accept this version of Rose's reasoning.
"Ah, right. Well, why don't you ask Al to go with you?"
"Mum!" cried Rose, appalled. "I can't take my cousin as a date! That's gross! And really sad! Plus, that won't make Scorpius jealous – he'd probably just laugh!"
"Ok, ok!" conceded Hermione. "That was a bad suggestion. What about Dean's son, Matt?"
Rose pulled a face.
"He's not cool enough. I need someone who would make Scorpius feel inferior."
Feeling slightly odd about encouraging her daughter to make a friend feel second-rate, Hermione said, "Well, what about Kingsley's nephew, Nathan? Isn't he part of the 'popular crowd'?"
Rose pondered this.
"I guess I could go with him. But what if he's already got a date?"
"Well, according to Kingsley, the girl he's got his eye on has gone on holiday and won't be back for the ball. Why don't I invite them round and you can ask him then?"
"Ok, then," nodded Rose, feeling slightly better about her situation. "Me and Nathan get on alright, and I did do him that favour the other week…"
"What favour was that?" asked Hermione curiously.
"Oh, nothing!" said Rose quickly, realising who she was talking to. "I just helped him with his, um, Transfiguration homework, that's all."
"Alright, then," said Hermione sceptically, watching as her daughter hurriedly washed up her mug and put it in on the draining board.
Rose smiled as she turned back to face her mum.
"Thanks for your help mum. You won't tell dad about me and Scorpius, will you?"
"What, and cause him to have a heart attack? No, I think we'll keep that information to ourselves."
"Thanks," said Rose gratefully. "I think I'm gonna go and see if Al and Lily are in; they'll want to know all about you and Viktor Krum!"
With a wave, Rose left the kitchen, leaving Hermione to ponder how very much Ron had tempted fate when he'd told Rose not to get too friendly with Scorpius, and how much the pair's relationship seemed to be mirroring her own.
After all, it was pretty obvious Rose and Scorpius were just as much in denial about their feelings for each other as she and Ron had been.
It was refreshing to know that she wasn't the only one who had fallen in love with her best friend without realising so…