I wrote this originally for the Forum Collab 2 on NGF, but that got cancelled, so this is just for Zhie anyway.

It's about 6 months old, so it's not brilliant, but...

I don't own anything

~x~

He holds her close as her body is wracked by the intensity of her sobs, dutiful in his duties to best friend to both Rose Weasley and Lindsay Turner, the latter of whom is cashing in on this help card right now. He's been doing this since he can remember, comforting them about relationship failures, repeating that the entirety of mankind isn't to blame because, well, he's a man and he isn't like that.

"I loved him, though!" Lindsay cries out, her face burying itself into Albus' shoulder. "He was the one I thought I would be with forever!"

"I know, Linds, I know," he soothes her gently, ignoring the dull ache in his heart that gets stronger with every passing second as he holds her close.

Just as I love you.

He's loved her ever since he can remember, he thinks. Her beauty, it captivates him, binding him to the spot in which he stands, unable to move from the chance to comfort her. The sweetness of her skin, the scent envelops his nostrils as he processes now much he wants to lift her head and kiss her.

But he can't because, well, she's just been dumped by Ryan Finnigan, had her heart shot to pieces, her belief in love shattered. She isn't going to want to be kissed by the person who is supposed to be her best friend now, is she?

"Ssshhh," he soothes her, cradling her in his arms as he sits down on the sofa in his flat. She just apparated here out of nowhere at 3am, crying that he'd dumped her and how she can't go on any longer. So, of course he had to comfort her, to find out what's wrong… just to discover that she had been dumped by Ryan for some other girl from another school from around the world that he had met on his worldwide travelling he had to partake in before settling down.

He sits up with her all night, watching the dawn break slowly over the horizon as the colour of the sky turned from an ebony black, to being tinged pink, to ending up a blue that could only signal the start of a new day.

"Look at that, Linds," he says quietly, breaking the silence between them that had reigned since her sobbing ceased about an hour ago. "It's a new day, a fresh start. Leave him behind and just enjoy the sun."

"How can I, when he is out there having fun and I'm just here, alone?" she begins to wail again and he clutches her close again. As he does, his heart breaks further because she thinks she is alone. She doesn't register Albus on her radar… he's just the best friend she has always had but never really realised, if that makes sense.

"I think that you've just proven my point," he tells her gently but with a strong undertone to it. "I mean, why should he get to live his life happily whilst you mope around? He isn't worth it, Lindsay."

She snuggles into his chest, stemming the tears with her hand. "I love you Albus," she says gently. "You're the best gay friend I have," and, with that, she falls asleep on his chest.

Ahh yes, the slight issue there is with this situation: to explain why he hasn't dated anyone in the time since they left school, three years ago, he pretended to Lindsay that he is gay and that he is her gay best friend. That's how he gets the chance to be so close to her, to be able to see her emotional side without her wondering why a man is being like this. She would have been suspicious and never let him get this close to her, especially when her heart has just been broken.

So, he pretended he is gay, and the only people who know he isn't are his parents, Rose and Scorpius, who are, incidentally, the only people who know he loves Lindsay.

He scrapes the hair back from her face and plants a kiss on her forehead, wishing he can do this when she is awake…

… three weeks later…

She's more of herself than she was when Ryan first dumped her, but she still isn't the bubbly and out going girl that Albus has known for nine years… or is it more than that now? Yes, he decides, it's ten or eleven, but the date varies every time he contemplates this question.

It pains him to see her like this, to see her lacking in the self confidence she used to have in abundance: now, she barely leaves the house besides for work and never wears anything that could draw attention to herself. Rose has tried to explain to her that she needs to make Ryan jealous when he returns to England for this ball thing that they have to attend, as relatives of the 'saviours of the Wizarding World', something which makes them want to eat glass every year.

"Al…" Lindsay approaches the man sitting on his sofa completing some paperwork to allow him to go abroad next month as part of his training to be in the Magical Law Enforcement team. His Aunt Hermione got him into the idea of enforcing the law and, since he knows his family, he has a feeling that they need a friendly face on the inside!

"Yes?" he asks, looking up instantly with a small smile on his lips.

"I… I was thinking, even though I know you probably won't want to, but since neither of us have a date for the dance, do you want to go together?" she broaches the subject lightly, leaving the question hanging in the air almost visibly between the two of them.

His brain connects the somewhat confusing words to the fact that she thinks he is gay: she thinks that, because he isn't attracted to women, he won't go to a public function with her. But little does she know that he is jumping for joy on the inside, his heart unable to believe that she has asked him to the ball! Even if it is just to make Ryan jealous, he still got invited…

"Yeah, that'd be great," he manages a nonchalant shrug of his shoulders, as if this is just a deed he does every day – taking his straight female best friend (who he is absolutely in love with) to the dance to make her ex jealous.

"That's awesome then!" she says, visibly brightening. "I'll get a dress…"

"And I will come and pick you up tomorrow night, around seven thirty," he answers, barely able to keep his voice steady as he contemplates the fact he is going on a date with Lindsay! True, there are the barriers of the fact that she is emotionally unavailable (probably) and she thinks he is gay, but he is sure that they can get over them.

"See you then," she grins at him, a flash of the old Lindsay back as she disapparates from the flat in which he lives across town to her own.

He leans back in his seat, setting the paperwork and quill aside, stunned into silence as he processes the fact that he is going to the ball with the blonde beauty, the girl who has had him pining for her since they met. The second his green eyes connected with her sapphire blue orbs, he knew that they were destined for one another.

Slowly, he reaches out and picks up his phone, speed dialling number 1 on it.

"Hello?" Rose answers, sounding distracted.

"It's Al," he says back, his voice dreamy. "I need a suit for tomorrow. Can you help?"

~x~

The corsage in his pocket for Lindsay, he pulls up in his relatively new car outside her flat and toots the horn, signalling he has arrived. Rose pulled through with the suit, going one better and getting him a classic black tuxedo, arranging the flower for his jacket and Lindsay's corsage to match the piping on the inside of the jacket!

The front door opens and his breath catches in his throat as he sees the girl in the shimmery silver material that seems to float as she moves, the beading catching the glint from the sun in a way that only dazzles Al. her hair is pinned back in a classic bun, her makeup minimal as she smiles whilst waving at the driver of the car, running to get into the passenger seat.

"Hey," she says, reaching over and kissing him on the cheek gently before pulling her seatbelt on. "Oh, is that for me?" she notices the corsage hanging limply out of his pocket and grins as she reaches out for it as he mutely nods.

"You… you look amazing," he tells her honestly, once he has managed to find his voice. The radiance of the smile she gives him as he fumbles with the corsage on her wrist almost knocks him out and definitely increases his heart rate until it is going so fast that he thinks he is going to have a coronary.

With a great difficulty, he tears his gaze from the woman who is now fiddling with his radio and puts the car into drive, heading down the nondescript roads towards the venue which is, as ever, plain jane on the outside.

"After you, milady," he bows as he hands her out of the car before proceeding to walk with her up the steps and into the hall. It's kitted out with the most beautiful of flower arrangements adorning the walls and tables, the aroma almost strong enough to detract Albus from Lindsay. The décor is so perfect that he thinks he has stepped back in time to a time period where escorting a woman to a dance practically equalled a marriage proposal. If only this were the truth, he thinks to himself, a wry smile on his lips as he takes the arm of the woman he is accompanying.

All at once, he feels her stiffen up and he looks to his right to see Ryan standing there with his new arm candy, the replacement Lindsay. "He's not worth it… don't do anything stupid," Albus mutters as he senses rather than sees Lindsay reaching into her purse for her wand. "Come on, dance," he urges her and, after a long pause, she does as he asks.

Nobody watches quite possibly the most forgotten child in the Weasley clan as he steps onto the dance floor, putting his arm around her waist as her hand reaches up to his shoulder. He begins to whirl around the room with her in time to the music, showing off a talent few people knows he has, making her laugh as he tilts her back.

The desire for the woman he is with gets the better of him and, so rashly he almost regrets it the minute he has said it, he decides to ask her a dangerous question.

"Want to make him jealous?"

She grins and nods, stopping dancing as they reach the edge of the dance floor. This is where his brilliant idea runs out of steam – how do they make Ryan (who is looking in their direction) jealous? But she knows what to do.

She deliberately takes his hand and glances around to ensure nobody is looking, and then pulls Albus into the darkened corner. Instantly, she presses herself against the wall and pulls him in front of her, wrapping her arms around his neck.

"Are you sure?" she confirms and he nods, the lust for her more than anything he could possibly endeavour to put into words.

The moment her lips press gently against his cause fireworks to erupt in his mind. It's as if he can only feel her, smell her, hear her. She intoxicates him as he finds his arms moving to wrap themselves around her waist without him ordering them to, pulling her closer to him as he begins to deepen the kiss.

Inside, he knows that this is wrong and if she knows that he isn't gay, she could be angry. But… but she kisses him back.

Gone is the pretence that it is just to make Ryan jealous, as one hand wraps itself into his jet black hair as the other snakes its way down to the lower of his back to sneak under his jacket and up the back of his shirt. One of his hands slides down each side of her body, tracing the curves of her hips, her bottom, reaching down for the bottom of her dress. Things begin to heat up as she allows him into her mouth, kissing him more passionately than even a minute ago.

Nobody watches them now, not even Ryan who has run away someplace else in the room. The moment is their's and their's alone, no annoying best friend or cousin to come and burst in on them, as is what usually occurs in his fantasies about this moment.

Somehow, however, he comes to his senses and realises he doesn't want to do this here. so he pulls away from her, far enough away that he can see into her confused looking eyes.

"That… that wasn't making him jealous, was it?" she confirms pointlessly, the blush rising in her cheeks as she speaks. Slowly, he shakes his head and smiles ever so slightly, suddenly aware of just how intimate he is with her.

"No… I'm sorry, Lindsay, for lying to you… I'm not gay, I never have been," he whispers into her face, watching as her unblemished skin crinkles into a frown. Before she can speak, he continues, "I wanted to be closer to you, even when you were with others, so I… it was easier to pretend to be something I'm not than to explain why I didn't date anyone else. I'm sorry for lying to you, I am."

"Shut up," she whispers, her face openly showing she doesn't care. "Just kiss me again."

And that is something he is all too happy to oblige in doing.

~x~

They walk out of the corner a good half an hour later, to find Rose and Scorpius lying in wait for them by the confectionary table.

"Where on earth have you been?" Rose asks them, her eyes narrowing as she processes their slightly sweaty skin, the way they are both flushed and… "Wait, is your arm around her waist?" she confirms, drawing attention to the casual intimacy between the new couple.

"Um, yes, I think it is," Albus says with an even bigger smile than what was previously on his face.

"So… so you know that he isn't, you know?" she addresses this question to Lindsay who nods and smiles.

"Yes, I know he isn't gay… I sort of suspected it, since I have never seen a man around and the magazines I found in his room," she laughs, resulting in a furious blush rising in Al's cheeks.

Rose and Scorpius exchange a glance of amusement before turning back to the new couple, chorusing, "Took you long enough!"

~x~

Please don't favourite without revieiwng

Vicky xx