Seventh year was going about as well as expected up until today. Today, of course, being the first day back at Hogwarts. In our rush to get to the train, I forgot my trunk- which held my school robes and most of my books. All I had was my backpack, which held a few books, a computer I had charmed to work around magic, a whole bunch of WWW products, and some garments which could technically be called pajamas, but really I just didn't want for any of my family to accidentally see them if they went sniffing through my trunk for the aforementioned WWW products.
So, I was getting on the train, as Head Girl, without my school uniform or anything that really proved I was fit for the position, except for my wand.
"Hullo, Daffodil." I rolled my eyes, knowing exactly who was walking into the prefects' carriage. It was Scorpius Malfoy, the only translucent wizard to ever live.
"Let me guess, Aquila, our academic rivalry which has pushed you to do better than you could ever hope otherwise has resulted in you becoming Head Boy?" I said flatly, knowing this was going to happen. We had spent the last sixteen years battling out over who was smarter, who was better at quidditch, who was more charming, and even one summer when we were six, who had better aim with their pee.
That one was one of the few that was inarguably won, by me no less.
…
Our rivalry started around age four, on the first day of preschool. I wanted to be the best in class at art, and so did he. We spent hours arguing about who had drawn the better stick figure, and when our parents came to pick us up, the teacher directed them to the art room, where we had barricaded ourselves in, trying to get more time so we could argue about who was better. Our fathers were in for quite a shock when they recognized one another at the pick-up that day, both having moved to the muggle village of Cokeworth to get some privacy from the magical world.
Our fathers never actively encouraged our rivalry on the basis of old blood feuds. They did, however, encourage us to be the best, and for Malfoy and I that meant being the best in every way possible. I beat him at maths, he squelched me in English, I trumped him in French, he topped the class in history. And so on, and so forth.
Whenever we played games in gym class at school, we were on opposite teams, because our teacher liked how much aggression we brought out in one another. Looking back, that man may have been a bit loony.
We even had to both play bloody piano, just to try one-upping the other at each recital.
The lack of adult supervision at Hogwarts proved to only aid in our contention.
In October of our first year, after a month of relative peace, he pointed out that I was a "brash, idiotic, hero-complex-having numbskull" who should've been in Gryffindor rather than Slytherin. I stormed out, but not before hammering in his point and lightly punching him in the face, telling him that he was too much of a caveman to have been sorted into Ravenclaw.
The next day I made it so that he could only shoot rubber ducks out of his wand every time he tried to cast a spell.
As we continued through our years here, we got in more and more heated arguments. They were usually petty, bickering arguments, normally about academics, sometimes crossing into appearance, but never about our families. In our fifth year he toed the line. He told me that I only got good grades because my parents were bloody war heroes, and I told him it was better to have war-hero parents than a coward who couldn't even stick to his convictions and hate everyone else properly.
I snuck into the Ravenclaw dormitory later that night under the invisibility cloak and when he was finally alone in the dormitory slipped it off to reveal myself and a bottle of apology firewhiskey. He said nothing, just picked up the cloak and wrapped it around both of us, and brought me up to the Astronomy tower where we spent the night drinking and talking about the stars.
I woke up the next morning and slipped out from under his arm, and when I saw him at breakfast we began bickering over whether butter or jam was a better topping for toast. It ended in hexes that sent us on our weekly rounds to the hospital wing and Filch's office.
…
Scorpius smirked "yeah, something like that" he said as I turned towards him. I saw his hand held out, with a pumpkin pasty. My favorite.
"Um, thanks, here I can give you money. Four sickles, right?" I said, rummaging through my backpack.
I finally found my wallet and was starting to search through there (I really needed a better organizational system) when I looked up to see his eyes boring holes through my shirt. Just what I needed, a hormonal head parter. Well, a hormonal Head partner, though I could definitely use a hormonal head partner.
But that would not be Scorpius Malfoy.
"It's alright, how about you just owe me a favor, Daisy?"
"No way in hell, Circinus."
"Well then let's just make it a present from one Head to another."
"Yeah, alright."
We sat down to eat our candies, me with my pumpkin pasty, him with his licorice wand. I avoided talking, because I didn't want prefects to arrive while we were fighting, which is what talking always lead to. Unfortunately, Malfoy didn't have the good sense to shut up just right then.
"So how long do you think it'll be before we have to give detentions?"
"If any students live up to our track record, I'd give it an hour."
We both snorted in laughter. Maybe talking wouldn't go downhill so quickly. We were both incredibly mature students who managed to trick the faculty into giving us Head positions, despite our slightly violent streak.
"Since when do you have a figure, Poppy?" Malfoy was looking at me with a hint of amusement in his eye. He was just trying to goad me. I could goad right back.
I ran a finger down his arm, "I've had it for a while, but robes are just not particularly revealing."
"Yeah, but I've seen you in uniform and you don't look like this." Malfoy's eyes were flickering between my exposed thighs and midriff. I had worn a short skirt and a slightly revealing crop top today, assuming, like an idiot, that I would have my uniform to change into as soon as I got to King's Cross. I'm not blaming Al, but he was going to have some trouble keeping his hair on his head for the next few days.
I couldn't exactly blame Malfoy for staring, I even enjoyed it a little. Plus, it made me feel less weird about looking at his arms, which apparently filled in a bit over the summer.
The door then opened and a few fifth years scuffled in, looking particularly pleased with themselves for having made prefect.
…
"Alright, underlings, any other questions?" I concluded the meeting, receiving a few laughs from the prefects. Really, everyone except for Al. He was rather irritated with me because his wild hair was changing colors every five minutes.
I dismissed the meeting and turned to Malfoy.
"Well, shall we start rounds?"
"What if we just stayed here and reflected upon how incredibly rude it is to call prefects underlings?" Malfoy said, looking a little disgruntled.
"Oh come on that was a joke, you know it."
"Do I though? How sure am I that you don't just want them all under you?" He said, smirking slightly.
"Oh, if I wanted someone under me, they'd be under me." I snapped as I opened the door.
We walked in relative silence while we did rounds, reminding students to put on robes soon and not to jinx each other in the corridor. Oh, how the mighty have fallen.
"So who do you want under you, then, Carnation?" Malfoy asked as we got back to the prefects' carriage. I hopped onto the table, pulled out my laptop from my backpack, and started on the schedule.
"Why do you ask, Achilles?" I looked up from what I was doing as I saw him sit next to me. He leaned over me, innocently pointing at the screen and said "McLaggen can't go with Turner, they'll be making use of the broom closets rather than checking them." His eyes and mine connected, lit only by the dim screen. His face was just a few inches away. What was that so unnerving all of the sudden? I blushed a little as he withdrew his hand, lightly grazing my now thigh in the process.
"And I ask because I need to know if I should remind you to put a silencing charm on your room, slag." Like that, any ideas I had about broom closets were whisked away.
"Oh, I'm not the one who's had a string of girlfriends since third year."
"It hasn't been a string, and you have dates with a new boy every other weekend."
"Have you been watching me, Malfoy?" I teased, knowing my dating life was public knowledge, primarily because any boy who got near me usually decided to call it off after a date or two once they realized I really wasn't anything like my heroic parents. I was just trying to win, my parents were noble and had good intentions and all that lovely bullshite.
"Well, with an arse like yours it's hard not to."
"You only noticed my figure today, dumbarse."
He shrunk a little, "Fair point, but what a lovely figure it is."
"Stop or I'll think you want to be under me." I was starting to toy with this idea when I realized how horrifically bad that would be. I mean, he was good looking, but I've seen abs before. I can see them again. They don't have to belong to the competition.
"You couldn't get me under you for all the money in Gringotts."
"Uh huh," I said, wondering what that exchange had been about. "Come on, let's finish this rota so we don't have to do anything tonight."
We sat, working, for the rest of the train ride.
…
Malfoy jinxed me covertly during dinner. I'm not sure what prompted it, but I sure as hell wasn't going to let it happen again, I thought, walking up to the Head Dorms from dinner. Why on earth did they have to be in a tower?
I would've much preferred it be near the dungeons, so I could go say hello to the merpeople that came up to our window. Or near the kitchen, so I could get food when midnight cravings hit, without worrying about curfew.
But no, it had to be in the middle of bloody nowhere, in a tower. Just my luck.
"Bippity boppity boo" I heard myself saying, telling the portrait my chosen password. The portrait was of a small dog with a suit on, holding a deck of cards.
"Are you serious? Clearly we should go with 'abracadabra'" Malfoy teased. I really wasn't in the mood for it. I had some messing with his head to do.
I was going to retort when the portrait opened, and I saw a beautiful head dorm in front of me. It had a small kitchen, two big loveseats, a grand fireplace, and a set of bookshelves that was like their own miniature library.
She gasped a little, and wandered in. "Fucking a."
"We need to set ground rules."
"Like what you tit? It's just a living room."
"Yeah but if I'm forced to spend this much time around you I need some assurance you won't try to poison me in the night. Or set a small horde of pygmy puffs loose in here."
Ah, I did that a few years ago to the Ravenclaw dormitory- I mean, really? A riddle? That was their protection?
"Ok" I said, conjuring a piece of paper and an oversized marker. I wrote 'Rules for the Super Secret Head Clubhouse' on it, and looked up expectantly.
"What rules do you want?" I said, a bit impatient.
"Let's start with visitors? I give the password to one person, you give it to one person?"
"Alright, I'm giving it to Gen."
"Not one of your cousins?"
"Well, you'll probably give it to Al, and the rest of them don't deserve a place like this." I said, looking lovingly at my new abode.
"I mean, you're not wrong, but what if I wanted to give it to a girlfriend or something? How would you know?"
"You don't do relationships that serious unless they're with my cousin or licorice wands."
"Yeah, alright."
He got up and started puttering around the kitchen. He put water on for tea and grabbed two cups. "I'll take mine with just a bit of sugar."
"Who said I'm making you tea?"
"There's no one else around."
"Maybe I wanted to cups."
"Yeah, but in that case you would've just gotten a really big cup."
"Oh, yeah."
We sat in a tense silence for a moment.
"Alright, if one person makes tea they have to offer to make a cup for the other person."
"That's a shit rule." He rolled his eyes.
"Yeah, but I think it'll help us be civil or something. At least when there's boiling water around."
He snorted. "Alright, and if you're going to sing in the shower I would like to request that it only be songs by the Beatles or ABBA."
"ABBA? Really?
"What, I had a crush on Amanda Seyfried as a kid. I liked her big eyes."
"I have big eyes and I've never heard a word in compliment of them."
"Well, you also have a big head, so I didn't want to stroke your ego."
"What did you want to stroke?" I asked, not sure if I was teasing or flirting. I found myself leaning forwards across the counter as I said it, biting my lip as I looked up at him. I bite my lip a lot. It really wasn't meant to be sexual.
"Why do you always go to sex, Hydrangea?" I saw him eyeing my lip. He could bite it, if he wanted. No, no, no, no, no. You've been sending one another to the hospital wing for years dueling, what the ever living fuck was going on.
"I never said anything about sex. Maybe I was talking about hair." Yeah, that's right, I just sidestepped him. Boom, bitch.
"Alright, maybe. Sneaking Slytherin tease."
"Repugnant Ravenclaw slag."
We sobered up with our insults. It was too easy to rile one another up.
"As much as I like alliterations, can we finish the damn rules and go to our rooms in peace."
"Alright, what else do we even need on here?"
"One last rule. Always keep tequila and limes in the kitchen. Oh, and ingredients for waffles."
I snorted in laughter. "Yeah, works for me."
Neither of us were big into partying, but Malfoy and I sure as shit liked getting a bit buzzed.
