Hey! This is Magicallyemmersed ;-) I came back with a Rose Weasley/Scorpius Malfoy oneshot. I hope you enjoy it!

Disclaimer: The everything else except for the plot belongs to J. .

Having a secret crush on your best friend wasn't as glamorous as the romance books described.

Scorpius had been her best friend ever since she could remember. She had helped him through his countless girlfriends and the drama that resulted from it, not quite understanding why girls would remotely like him. To Rose, he had been just a friend who was a boy that played pranks on her. These days, however, she was beginning to be aware of what all the other girls seemed to notice in him, what she had failed to see the past six years.

Scorpius was undeniably attractive. Looking back, she was amazed that she did not notice his handsomeness until now. She could understand why all the girls were fawning over him and trying to set up dates with him whenever they could. Even now, as he was playing Quidditch with her and Albus on a sunny Saturday, Rose could not help but notice how his white-blond hair reflected the sunlight, and how strong he seemed to be, whizzing through the air in an incredible amount of speed.

Sharp pain in her head interrupted her from her thoughts. Albus had managed to hit her on the head with a quaffle.

"I thought I'd never live to see Rosie miss the quaffle!" Scorpius exclaimed, laughing so hard that he almost fell off his broom. "You should have seen your face when you were hit!"

She felt annoyance surge through her. It was true, she had never missed the quaffle when she was playing with her best friends. It surprised her that Albus managed to hit her on the head. She must have been completely zoned out.

Albus flew over to her, but he was also roaring with laughter. She rolled her eyes. Although they looked mature, they still seemed to have the attitude of a four-year-old. Rose cautiously felt the back of her head. Quidditch injuries were severe, no matter how light the accidents were. Sure enough, there was a big lump forming on the back of her head. She would have to go to Madam Pomfrey for this. Wincing, she tilted her broom down and lowered herself to the ground.

The boys were still laughing.

Rose trudged across the field to the changing rooms. She didn't understand why she was feeling so upset. On normal days, she would have had a good laugh with them, too. Now she was sulking because a certain Malfoy did not seem to care whether she was injured. Rose sighed and brushed her red hair back out of habit, flinching when she touched the ever-growing knot on the back of her head.

She knew she should ignore this fluttery feeling she got whenever she saw Scorpius. He was her best friend. She was afraid to lose him completely. Rose could not bear the thought about her life without Scorpius. If she didn't have him as a friend, there would be nobody to talk to whenever she was feeling particularly curious about something. There would be no more late-night discussions about the ways an alpaca could crossbreed with a unicorn and still survive or debates about the uses of dragon blood. There would be nobody to comfort her in the special way that Scorpius did when she was upset. Scorpius played a major role in her life, and she tried to believe that these small feelings were not worth throwing all those things that were important to her away. She had to pretend that she didn't care about him more than a friend. She had to act normal.

Albus and Scorpius flew over to her, matching her walking pace on their broom.

"You should have seen your face when…" Ignoring Scorpius, she turned to Albus.

"Could you take my broom for me, Al? I think I need to visit Madam Pomfrey."

Al nodded, looking confused but worried.

"It didn't hit you that hard, right? Merlin, Rose. I'm so sorry. I thought you were paying attention."

Rose was about to answer when Scorpius butted in dismissively. "She'll be fine, Al. Rosie isn't the keeper of the Gryffindor team for nothing."

Rose took a deep breath, trying to convince herself that his words didn't have a big impact on her, and trying to ignore the slight pang of hurt she felt. Couldn't he at least pretend to be concerned about her? "I'm fine, Al. I just need you to take my broom, that's all." Handing Albus her broom, she trudged over to the castle.

After visiting Madam Pomfrey and getting her head fixed, Rose wandered around the castle, looking for Al and Scorpius. Not seeing them anywhere, she trudged to the library. Whenever she needed some time of her own, she came to the library to think and lose herself in another world. The faint, musty smell of books and the silence there always managed to soothe her. She began looking for a book to read. She reached for a book on the top shelf that looked interesting and reached for it on her tiptoes.

If she had been just a few inches taller, she would have grabbed the book with no difficulty at all. However, standing at the height of 5.3 feet, she was too small to reach the book on her own. She huffed in frustration. Her dad was tall, Hugo was tall, and her mom wasn't small either. Somehow, she managed to be the smallest one in her family. She made a wild grab for the book one more time, almost falling over in the process.

Another hand grabbed the book she was aiming for with ease, taking it down from the shelf. She whirled around, bumping into someone. Scorpius was standing right behind her with her book in his hand, amused.

"Here you are, Rose," he handed the book over to her, looking like he wanted to laugh out loud.

"Stop laughing at me!" she whispered indignantly, looking around to see if Madam Pince was nearby.

"I'm not laughing at you," he whispered back, his left eye twitching. His eyes were grey, reflecting her own blue ones.

Mentally shaking herself, Rose rolled her eyes and turned back to the bookshelf, pretending that what he just did didn't affect her the slightest. She never noticed how tall he was. He was so much taller than her, about a head tall. She jumped a little when Scorpius whispered a 'bye' into her ear before he left, feeling goosebumps rise up against her skin. She took a deep breath. She found herself wondering why he was acting nicer to her all of a sudden. She recalled how he had gotten the book for her when he did nothing like that to other girls. She smiled.

Rose tried to stop her flow of insignificant thoughts about Scorpius.

"What he did was all platonic," she told herself firmly. "Stop trying to analyze his every action. "

You're his best friend, and you need to stay that way,"

She shook her head as if shaking would help her clear her thoughts as well. She opened up her book and began to read, but her mind kept on drifting to Scorpius.

"Stop this!" She internally told herself. "You are daydreaming about him, not focusing on your book. Since when did Rose Weasley become incapable of focusing on a book?"

Rose slammed the book shut, and walked out of the library. Reading, for once, was not working its magic on her like it used to. She let out a sigh. She needed to climb out of this trap of Scorpius Malfoy she had managed to stupidly fall into and become normal once more before anybody else noticed it.

!

During the next few days, Rose found herself analyzing Scorpius's every move towards girls (including herself). She was scared of the feelings she harbored for him. Although she tried her best to ignore it and pretend that she did not have a crush on him, she found her thoughts getting harder to press down.

To her horror, she was doing things and feeling emotions she did not know she was capable of feeling. For example, on Monday Scorpius helped Alicia Goldstein carry her books to her class. On Tuesday he held the door for her, smiling. Rose felt burning jealousy flaming inside of her, which she tried her best to ignore. Alicia was one of her closest friends, and she did not need to feel such a childish emotion because of one simple thing Scorpius did. She also found herself testing Scorpius, checking to see whether he spoke first to her and counting the number of conversations they have had.

It was absurd. She felt like a stalker.

"He thinks of you as a friend," Rose repeated to herself. "He probably likes Alicia, and I don't care. He is my best friend. He is not interested in me," she kept saying, trying to take her mind off of Scorpius.

To her absolute horror, she found that she could not concentrate sometimes when she was studying; her brain drifting into various episodes she had had with Scorpius. Whenever that happened, she would press down hard on her parchment with her quill, often making a hole or breaking her quill in the process. This week, she had to buy a new bundle of quills because all the tips of her old ones were broken.

Rose fought with her mind to control herself, to not think about him or analyze his actions. She tried to convince herself that what Scorpius did didn't matter to her, she was his friend, and that he wasn't interested in her in that way. However, what really drove her crazy was a small question of doubt raised in her mind, "But then why did he do that to me, when he doesn't do it to other girls?" whenever she pictured her past interactions with him. Whatever she did, she couldn't snuff out that little thought that maybe he did have feelings for her, and was hiding it from her.

!

Rose was still confused. Scorpius had been so nice to her the past few days, she could not stop smiling when she was with him. He had helped her with her arithmancy homework and begged with puppy eyes to help him with his transfiguration homework in return. They spent hours together, doing homework and occasionally abusing their professors as well. She never laughed so much while she was doing her homework, which was saying something. She wondered whether he did this because she was his best friend. A part of her wished that he saw her as something more than a friend, as she did to him.

!

Rose had hall patrol today. Humming a little, she began checking all broom closets and shooing out couples who were inside. Nothing, even too much explicit cases of PDA, could dampen her mood. She found herself smiling from time to time, her mind recalling the afternoon she had spent with Scorpius and Albus next to the lake. Scorpius and she were getting along great these days. She thought that he was nicer and more considerate towards her than before. He made her smile often. She wished that this relationship would last forever.

Without paying much attention, she swung the last broom closet door open. What she saw would be scarred into her mind for a long time.

A familiar white-blond head was desperately kissing a smaller figure with long brown hair. Rose dropped her wand in shock. That couldn't be Scorpius. That just couldn't be him, the one who was kissing the girl with so much intensity.

The couple jumped apart, hearing her wand fall on the floor. Scorpius looked at her, his face sheepish.

"Hey, Rosie. Sorry you had to see me like that. Uh, this is my girlfriend…"

Scorpius kept saying something, but Rose did not hear it. She noticed that he kept on looking at the girl, who was staring at the floor with a blush on her cheeks, with a tenderness that she had never seen before.

Scorpius had a girlfriend. That realization hit her like a ton of bricks. He had a girlfriend. Scorpius was waving a hand in front of her face.

"You okay, Rosie? Rose?"

She snapped out of her thoughts. She had to act nonchalant like she didn't care about it. She plastered a fake grin on her face.

"Yeah, I'm good. Congratulations to you two!" She exclaimed, blinking rapidly. Scorpius didn't seem to notice.

"I'm glad you like her, Rose. That means a lot to me, you being my best friend and all,"

Rose smiled and nodded, but she felt like she was crumbling inside. "Although you're my best friend, it doesn't mean that you're getting free passes to detention," she tried to say lightly, taking out her detention slip.

"Rosie please?" Scorpius looked at her with puppy eyes.

She felt tears prickling in her eyes again. She covered it up with another smile, rolling her eyes. "Fine, just this once. Don't let me catch you making out again. It's not a pretty sight to see," she joked, willing her voice not to quiver.

With a grin towards her way, Scorpius ran out, pulling his girlfriend out by the hand. His girlfriend smiled at her shyly before following him out.

Rose walked towards her dorm, keeping her tears in and acting as if nothing had happened. "It's nothing," she kept on telling herself. She didn't care about it. She didn't care that to Scorpius, she was just a friend, nothing more. Just a friend to be with, like Albus. Not a person to love or to cuddle with, but just a friend. She was devastated.

Friend. That one word, once so comforting and welcoming, seemed so cold and distant now. She wished that they could be something more, but she knew that that would be impossible now. Scorpius only saw her as a friend, not a girl.

In romance books, the girl character always manages to snag the attention of the boy character, one way or another. The boy or some other character managed to get them together, the boy also magically having a secret crush on her as well. However, Rose thought bitterly, her life didn't take place in a book. It was real, and even though she had a crush on her best friend, nobody found out and it didn't stop him from getting a new girlfriend. Life sucked.

Rose knew that tomorrow, she would have to act like nothing happened between them, that she was happy for his new girlfriend, and that she would never show jealousy or her heartbreak because that's what best friends did to each other. Because that was what Rose would do to Scorpius. Because that's what happened in real life.