AN: This is my entry for the Quidditch Finals. My prompt was to advertise Canary Custards. My word count is 975 words. And for those who are curious, this is Cursed Child compliant :)


Scorpius Malfoy's romantic senses were tingling when he heard a shriek from Rose's seat in the Potions dungeon. Like out of a movie, he slowly whipped around to see that where Rose Granger-Weasley once was, a canary perched, looking particularly angry for a canary.

"Rose?" he asked as several of the other Gryffindor girls giggled. "Rose, is that you?"

The canary started flittering and twittering about angrily.

"Okay, okay," Scorpius said, throwing his hands up in a white-flag surrender. "I can get you back to normal, no problem. Weasley's Wizard Wheezes, right?"

She tweeted even more angrily, and Scorpius glanced down at the box. He then focused on what he'd learned in an article he'd read about the Transfiguration process of human-to-animal (written by their own headmistress, he was proud to discover) and raised his wand.

"Morpheus Nox," he said, picturing the canary morphing back into Rose, who smelled like bread and was so pretty and so smart and–

Tone it back, he told himself forcefully, focusing his mind again. First, nothing happened. Then, the canary shimmered, and Rose took its place on her Potions stool.

"Thanks," she said breathlessly, her dark eyes wide and taken aback at Scorpius's help. "You're not so bad after all, Breadhead."

Scorpius tried to not blush. She'd called him that ever since he too-eagerly informed her of her bread-like scent.

Scorpius smiled and turned away to try and hide his blush.

"Why are you so pink?" Albus asked–and then he saw his cousin staring at Scorpius with a rather intense expression. "Ah. Good luck, mate."


"Wotcher! Wait up, Breadhead!"

Scorpius whipped around to see Rose Granger-Weasley marching towards him with her "game face" on (the very same one she wore when she scored the record amount of goals in a Hogwarts Quidditch match for a single player) and her girl gang behind her.

"Did I do something to displease you?" he asked, faintly aware of the warmth in his face.

"Actually, for once, no," she said, sounding as pleasantly surprised as he felt. "I wanted to thank you back there, for de-Transfiguring me."

"Well, it's no problem, as long as you have the proper spell and concentration," Scorpius rambled, looking at Rose's trainers rather than her face. "I mean, spells are the first part and–"

"Yes, yes, all that's well and good," Rose said carelessly. "But we were wondering if you wanted to come to the library with us?"

Scorpius glanced helplessly at Albus. He didn't want to leave his best friend behind, but maybe this was his chance?

"He can come too," one of the other girls said with a twinkle in her eye.

Scorpius and Albus exchanged a glance, and then both nodded.

"Don't worry, Madam Patil loves me," Rose said, and she took Scorpius's hand to lead him along. He never wanted to let go, not in a hundred years.


The thing was, she never returned to her previously icy ways. She kept asking Scorpius to study with her, an eagerness in her chocolate-brown eyes that Scorpius fell in love with all over again. He thought he might've caught her glancing at him when she thought he wasn't looking, but he never could be entirely sure.

One of these glances, however, did trigger a conversation Scorpius would never forget.

"Like what you see, Rose?" Scorpius asked teasingly when he thought he saw her eyes lingering on his hair of all things.

"In your dreams, Breadhead," Rose scoffed, a pink rising in her cheeks. "I just noticed you didn't slick it back today."

Scorpius shrugged, not wanting to admit that Albus had advised him that Rose liked boys with messy hair.

"I just like it this way," he half-lied.

"Well, it looks better than the usual," she said, before looking back down to her astronomy charts.

When Scorpius left the library, and later entered his dorm, he found a note in his bag.

Want to go to Weasley's Wizard Wheezes this Hogsmeade weekend, Breadhead?

The next day, before Potions, Scorpius shyly prodded her shoulder.
"Yes."


Hogsmeade was beautiful in the snow-covered hills. Scorpius couldn't believe his luck. Out on a date with Rose Granger-Weasley, and although he was sure she wouldn't call it a date, she actually seemed happy to be out there with him.

They strolled through Weasley's Wizard Wheezes, looking at all the marvelous items. Scorpius was about to be bold and suggest that Rose purchase the Canary Custards when she grabbed him by his Slytherin scarf and kissed him. Right on the mouth.
His first kiss.

Several years later, the night before their wedding, Scorpius sat next to his fiancée with a burning question.

"Why did you ever take a chance on me, all those years ago?" he asked. "You hated me, remember?"

"Well, first off, I never really hated you," Rose began. "I hated...who you might've been. I couldn't accept that maybe you were Voldemort's son, or even that you were a Malfoy. I'd been told that someone like you was naturally bad. I couldn't have known that you wouldn't be such a prat."

"I didn't accept it myself, for the longest time," Scorpius admitted. "Not until fourth year, really."

"Yes, but well," Rose hesitated. "What really gave me the courage to see that you weren't some needy obsessive prat son of the Dark Lord was when you helped with the Canary Custards."

"That was nothing," Scorpius admitted with a shrug. "You probably would've turned back anyway without my help."

"Well, I was scared and didn't know that they were from a joke shop," Rose admitted.

"Dad sent them, probably as a joke. But that showed me how nice you were. That I was wrong."


And that, Wizards and Witches, is how you get the girl using Canary Custards.