Thank you for your wonderful feedback, you guys. I'm going to reply to your reviews ASAP, I promise, you just all hit me at once and I've been super busy! (Not that that means I don't want the reviews, of course! Oh, p.s. while I'm on the subject, speaksis2, if you're reading this, thank you so much for reviewing, not just only this but other fics of mine, but I can't message you as your PM is disabled. So I'll thank you here! :D)

I hope you all enjoy meeting Rose. :D Let me know what you think of her? And Scorpius isn't much of a jerk at the moment, nor do I think he's going to be as bad as I thought (as I re-wrote a couple of the later chapters). After all, we all love Scorpius too much to hate him even a little, right? :D

I hope you like this chapter:

It may have been a futile wish, but by the next day, the heat wave hadn't disappeared. Platform Nine and Three-Quarters was packed full of people, the hyper kids running in circles and frantic animals combined with the steam from the train bringing about the sensation that I was going to burn alive at any second.

Thanks to my mothers freakish ability to be anywhere at least twenty minutes early, we'd already said our goodbyes, and stood around for five minutes, before I had to remind my parents that I wasn't eleven anymore, and that they could leave. They both had meetings to get to anyway, and they were only going to miss me stepping from the platform onto the train. Hardly exciting.

Teary eyed and beginning to be guided back out of the station by my exasperated father, my mother had reminded me to write to her, as she did every year, and then they'd left.

Not two minutes later I'd spotted Al's freakishly messy bundle of hair bobbing through the crowds. I managed to haul my trunk in one hand, my fluffy, black cat Menace firmly wrapped in the other arm as she complained meekly at me at the way she was being manhandled, and forced my way through the people, navigated by the sound of Lily Potter's laugh alone.

By the time I had reached them, Ginny Potter was frantically searching through her daughters trunk for something. Harry stood beside her, evidently teasing his eldest son, James, who'd probably only come to tease Al, in turn, as he had finished Hogwarts the previous year.

"Bloody nightmare, that cat," Al grinned at me as I came into sight. Menace had begun meowing in frustration at not being allowed to move.

I sighed angrily at her. "Fine, go on then."

Putting her gently on the floor, she gave me one last look to show she wasn't pleased with the way I'd handled her, then sauntered off. I knew she wouldn't go far, so I let her disappear whenever she wanted. She just complained at me otherwise.

I rolled my eyes, then remembered that she had already disappeared through the smoke in the direction of the train. And that she was a cat.

"I guess it's practice for if I ever get married," I joked, addressing the way Menace liked to treat me like I was a bumbling husband who couldn't ever do anything right.

"Now, Scor," Al slapped his hands around my shoulders in a way that I knew meant he was about to tease me. "You'd actually have to find a girl you were willing to be with for more than three days for it to be considered practice."

"Or one that would be willing to be with me," I pointed out.

Al smirked at that, but didn't have time to reply because Ginny stood up at that moment, sighed irritably, and then told her daughter disapprovingly, "You must have left it in the car, Lily. We'd better go check."

"Don't be long-" Harry began, before she cut him off.

"Yes, I know, Harry," Ginny glared at her husband. "But one of us has to do something productive instead of putting our child on a train to a school for magical children without a wand."

And then her and Lily disappeared through the smoke.

Harry and I shared a 'What was that about?' look, making me feel included in the family for all of two seconds.

"Good luck with that, dad," Al told him, grinning.

"I'd better go help," He sighed, but didn't really look that fazed - nothing fazed Harry anymore. "We'll be back in time to say goodbye."

As he walked away I could have sworn I heard him muttering something about how his wife's fretting on the first day back to school reminded him more and more of Hermione every year.

I turned back to Al and James. "So where is everybody else?"

Al shrugged. "Hugo and Rose haven't arrived yet. As for the others - I think they're all on the train already. Molly and Lucy had a huge argument - everybody's trying to avoid them."

I grinned. Sometimes I wished for a big family, so I'd have somebody to talk to about normal teenage stuff, somebody not Al, somebody who'd listen and not care if I said anything horrible, they'd just let me ramble and get everything out of my system. Of course, sometimes I do talk to Al about it, but… don't tell him I said this, but he's too sensitive - he begins to take things personally, or judge you if your comments are too harsh.

He's my best mate, but sometimes it bugs me.

But then, at times like this, when one thing gets blown out of proportion, or something personal becomes everyone's business, I feel relieved there's nobody to know.

"Hey Al, make sure you take somebody hot to graduation," James said, bringing me out of my reverie.

Al and I rolled our eyes together, before he turned to his brother, "I'm graduating next year, James. Don't you know how old I am?"

James faltered for a second. "Well yeah… now I do."

I tried to hide my grin, but I couldn't.

Al and James started to punch and poke each other - never having had a sibling I guessed they we're trying to annoy each other in oblivion - until James shouted suddenly, "Hey, I think I saw Marissa earlier: let's go tell her how much you looove her, Alby."

And then suddenly I was left alone as Al chased after him.

"Great," I mumbled to myself sarcastically. "First my cat, then the Potters. Maybe I'm just destined to be alone."

"Well if you keep talking to yourself like that," I heard a musical voice say from behind me. "I wouldn't be surprised if people kept their distance."

I spun on my heels at the sound, and came face to face with a girl - no, a woman - I couldn't place for a moment: her summer dress flowed until only about mid-thigh, the silken deep blue fabric probably kept her cool in the heat; long legs with her feet strapped in casual black sandals; her deep red curls pinned back away from the left side of her face to probably stop the strands from falling into her eyes; her bright, welcoming smile with just a hint of teasing; and the unmistakeable milky skin.

Regardless, it was the eyes that caught my attention: deeper than I'd remembered, the blue so inviting like the ocean, yet with brown flecks decorating them subtly.

My cat, Menace, was in her arms, purring, and that was enough to bring me back to the conversation.

Menace never likes anyone. Hell, she barely likes me sometimes.

"Bloody cat," I mumbled as she handed her over.

"I think she's adorable," That smile was back, so inviting.

"Yeah, so does she," I joked. "I think it's the fluffy black fur. My niece likes to brush her…"

Rose's lips broke out into a hug grin at that. "I don't remember you ever having a cat."

"I got her in third year, a present from Al, actually," I told her.

"Ah, there's your mistake," She whispered, leaning forward slightly as if we're sharing a secret. Her breath dangerously sweet, gentle. Like everything else about her. "You should never let Al come up with gifts."

"At least they're imaginative," I suggested.

She laughed. "That may be his problem. He thinks too much."

She was definitely joking by now. We shared a look, one that felt too close for the actual nature of our relationship - barely acquaintances. We we're sharing our knowledge of how utterly not smart Al was, just as if we'd had this joke for years.

I slapped my forehead jokingly, as if I'd just had an epiphany. "Of course, that's why Al's failing his exams…"

She nodded as if she was agreeing, all the while trying not to laugh. "He thinks too much, that's all."

We tried not to laugh for the next three seconds, then Menace let out a frustrated meow from her position on my trunk, probably annoyed that I had been giving a different female more attention than her.

"What's her name?" Rose asked.

"Menace."

She raised her eyebrows, and that smirk returned, playing lightly at her lips. "Optimistic," She teased.

I rolled my eyes, for some reason knowing she would take it completely the right way. "Well, I'd say I'm not as imaginative as Al, but who is?"

As she laughed, carefree, Al returned, James nowhere in sight.

It took all of half a second for him to notice that Rose and I were standing together, not only in willing polite conversation, but actually sharing a joke.

"Rose!" He exclaimed, and then they shared a long hug, whilst I stood there feeling more than a little awkward. "How was Italy?"

"A complete bore - I don't know why we decided to go there for the holiday," She told him dryly. Al's eye's went wide, as if in shock, evidently not getting the sarcasm.

Rose's eyebrows creased, and she looked to me to make sure that somebody got the joke. Noticing that I was trying not to laugh, she shot me a grateful smile.

It made me feel butterflies.

Which is not good.

I'd been talking to her for all of five minutes and now I was confused. She was so… nice, collected, confident, independent, friendly, open, happy, easy to talk to. The complete opposite of the Rose I knew and hated.

Where had that gangly awkward know-it-all gone?

Plus, butterflies are a girlish thing.

I don't think I'd ever heard one of my mates talk about a girl using that expression. They usually focus on physical appearance, and their personality. Not how they make them feel.

I suppressed a shudder at the thought of having that conversation with anybody in my dorm. It would be beyond awkward. I don't know how girls do it.

Luckily Harry, Ginny, Lily and James reappeared at that exact moment. I sensed it was my moment to give them time to say goodbye as a family, so I made a hasty retreat, waving goodbye to the others and telling Al I'd meet him on the train in our usual compartment.

Rose followed me.

Menace disappeared again, probably to find the trolley lady to sweetly meow some food out of her.

We dragged our trunks side by side in silence, and I helped haul Rose's onto the train when he reached it.

I think it was the most gentlemanly thing I'd ever done.

At it was completely by reflex.

"Thank you," She smiled at me kindly. "They don't teach heavy lifting at Beauxbatons."

I laughed, because I had to. "It's more of a discus school, then?" I joked.

That time she laughed too. "That would certainly be an improvement on 'Study Morning'."

I gave her a 'What the hell is that?' look, which clearly conveyed my dislike of that idea ever being instilled at Hogwarts.

"Yep," She guessed my meaning right away. "I swear, half of me thinks I left Beauxbatons just so I could have a lie in on Saturday mornings."

"I bet you wouldn't have gone in the first place if you'd known you had to work on Saturdays," I said as we wandered down the corridor of the Hogwarts Express.

Then, I suddenly wished I hadn't said it. Because part of me thought that if I hadn't come between her and Al, she might have been less inclined to leave Hogwarts in the first place. It's a thought I'd never had until then - I mean, I never actually did anything to annoy or upset her, I just hated her.

And now here we were, getting on well. Better than her and Al did nowadays, maybe.

Maybe I'm in a parallel universe.

"I'm glad I went," She continued. If she'd had any thoughts like mine, she'd brushed them off quickly so that it wasn't awkward. How about that for etiquette? "It's a brilliant school. And the people are lovely, and everybody's just so beautiful and well-groomed."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"Maybe I'll transfer next year."

She spluttered, trying not to choke, evidently completely unprepared to laugh, as I pulled back the door to the compartment that Al and I usually sat in.

"You don't mind if I sit with you, do you?" She asked. To be honest, I hadn't thought about it. I just assumed she would. But then again, why would I assume that? It would have been more likely that she'd want to sit with some of her girl cousins, not Al, me and some of our other mates.

"'Course not," I told her, as I leaned forwards to grab her trunk for her and took a step further into the compartment to let her pass me.

We we're greeted by 'hello's' from the two guys and the girl already sat down in the middle of the benches. Hamish and Maddie sat on the bench to our right, leaning forwards so that they could play a game of Exploding Snap with Oliver, Hamish's wand keeping the cards afloat in the space between them.

None of them had looked up. I finished stashing our trunks in the overhead hanger, and then gestured for Rose to follow me as I walked straight through the middle of their game and took a seat by the window on the left bench. Rose sat opposite me.

Just as I had planned, their cards tumbled to the floor, and they all finally looked up.

"What was that for?" Oliver scowled at me.

Then they all noticed Rose.

"Everybody, this is Rose," I told them, an odd feeling of pride coming over me. "Rose, this is Hamish, Maddie and Oliver."

"Rose!" Maddie suddenly squealed, practically jumping over Hamish as she climbed behind him over the bench. Hamish, ever the stoic, rolled his eyes and quietly glared. "Rose Weasley?"

Rose smiled wide, evidently not expecting anybody to remember her. "Maddie Finch?"

They hugged, whilst Oliver, Hamish and I shared a look which proved we thought it was weird. They hadn't spoken in five years, but yes, by all means, hug each other.

Girls.

"As in Al's cousin, Rose Weasley?" Oliver asked, and I caught the interest behind his eyes.

"Yes," I snapped, "So don't go getting any ideas."

"Ideas? What ideas?"

Hamish snorted. "Any McLaggen ideas," He clarified.

Oliver pretend glared at us both for a moment, then shrugged his shoulders in acceptance of the summary of his character. I rolled my eyes as I turned to Rose.

"Ignore him," I told her. "If he tries to touch you up, just smack him as hard as you can."

She looked thoroughly unnerved by the idea of some guy trying to touch her up - joke or not - and I remembered (again, too late) that she'd been at an all girls school for five years. She's got guy cousins, but she's not used to the normal teenage guy stuff.

Luckily, she latched on to a joke, giving her enough time to steady her facial features. I didn't think the others noticed, but I did.

"Don't worry," She grinned at me. "I've got mean arm muscles. I've had plenty of discus practice, remember?"

We both grinned, until Al's arrival interrupted us.

Another member of our little group, Ruth, was bundled in his arms, having been carried over the threshold of the compartment by Al like it was their wedding night.

Al wishes, I thought to myself. If only for the night.

He's always found Ruth hot, but they would rip each other's throats out if they tried to date for longer than, oh, I don't know, twenty minutes. They might make it half an hour, tops.

"Does nobody have control over this god forsaken creature?" She complained as Al unceremoniously dropped her onto the floor. "Scorpius?"

I shook my head as she stood up, brushing dirt off her shorts. "Ask Hamish."

"Ask Maddie."

"Ask Rose."

Ruth faltered at that, finally looking up at us all. "Who's-"

Then she caught sight of a now thoroughly nervous Rose, sitting in the corner. Rose gave a short, awkward wave. "Hi, I'm Al's cousin."

Ruth squinted at her for a moment, then muttered harshly. "I thought you were French."

"No, I just went to school there," To her credit, she hardly blinked at the rude reply.

"Then why are you here?"

"I go to school here now," Rose told her firmly, gaining some confidence now that she had clear questions to answer, not just awkward silence.

"Why?" Ruth asked abruptly as she threw herself onto the bench next to me, kicking off her shoes and placing her feet in my lap.

Rose eyed us for a moment, then stared defiantly right back at Ruth, something a lot of people don't do. "Why not?"

Ruth actually blinked at that.

I had to hand it to Rose, she was handling the situation (and by that I meant Ruth's rudeness) remarkably well.

Ruth considered the new girl for a moment, then shrugged like her brother had done earlier. "Welcome to Hogwarts then, I guess. I've never seen a sorting older than eleven, this'll be interesting."

"Rose was sorted when she came here in First Year, so she's not being sorted again," Al told everybody as Katie and Sam wandered in, hand in hand as always.

"Guess who has the best boyfriend ever?" Katie gushed as soon as the door was open.

"Guess who doesn't care," Ruth muttered under her breath.

I elbowed her. She stuck her tongue out at me. Al rolled his eyes at us. Katie ignored her.

"Who?" Even Maddie asked it in a rather bored voice, and Maddie was the nice one.

"Me!" Katie grinned, then proceeded to show her a necklace that Sam had bought her for their anniversary.

Katie and Sam are… inseparable. Maybe that word is used too often on couples, but they'd been together for four years now - that's longer than my parents were together before they got married - and they are hardly ever apart. Thankfully they're not the type of couple that only ever hang out with each other, but because we're all friends anyway, they're always with us, and always with each other at the same time, so it was just a natural development.

Katie proceeded to ramble on to Maddie, until the whistle blew one final time and I felt the train jolt. And suddenly the platform disappeared, soon to be replaced by countryside.

Not long after the train had left London, Al and the others had started a 'My holiday was better than yours' competition. They did it every year and I enjoyed it, not least because I could sit back quietly and listen to them verbally abuse each other, or catch up on some sleep.

I was half dozing, my head lolling back against the wall, sort of staring out the window, but really sneaking glances up at Rose, who had started up a conversation with Katie. Whatever she had said to start the conversation (and it had been Rose who had voluntarily started it, which I admired her for), Katie was evidently extremely pleased.

I think they are going to get on well.

I watched her gesture softly with her hands, smile brightly, nod encouragingly, and just generally carry herself well.

She was so well-presented and easy going; I couldn't stop watching her.

Ruth's voice and Oliver's exclamation of protest caught my attention, and we all turned to the verbal abuse conversation to hear who was losing this time.

As usual, it was Oliver.

"I'm not the one who hooked up with an old woman," Ruth shot towards her brother. A round of laughter roared out of the others as I smirked at Oliver.

He glared at his twin sister. "She was twenty five!"

"She was forty five with good bone structure," Ruth dead panned, to another round of laughter.

Oliver, knowing his sister's ability to relentlessly think up any number of witty comebacks, sulked into his seat.

As the others started to barter on how old the woman really was, Rose leaned towards me across the gap. Naturally, we leaned out heads close so that we could hear each other over the racket the others were making.

"Do I want to know the story behind that?" She mumbled, amused, as flicks of the ends of her curls brushed across my temple.

I shook my head - which didn't help my concentration - and grinned, "Definitely not."

"I'll trust your judgement," she smiled back.

We turned back to the conversation, and I caught Ruth, still with her feet in my lap, watching us, frown set in place.

I mouthed 'what?' and smirked at her, raising my eyebrows quizzically, to make her remember that she didn't own me.

Ruth was… complicated. Stubborn, harsh, macabre, and simply just unfriendly to anybody really. She had her pick of guys, and she was one hundred percent sure of herself.

She also had this thing about me. The guys teased me about her liking me (because, really, they weren't exactly going to tease her about it, she'd probably put them in a coma or something), but I still refused to believe that there was anything like feelings between us. We'd hooked up a couple of times at the end of last year, but we'd agreed we didn't want a relationship. We didn't even have feelings for each other.

She still did odd things though, which made us look like a couple: putting her feet in my lap, stroking my arm when we spoke, wiping food off my face, etc… It unnerved me, and I'd tried asking her to stop multiple times, but she'd just rolled her eyes and snapped, "Stop being such a girl, Scorpius, it doesn't mean anything."

Oliver called her rude names a lot, for just generally being his sister, and as payback for her crudeness with him, but mostly for being openly affectionate with me all the time. At the moment, 'slag' was his favourite name for her.

She called him 'man-whore'.

It was an odd, and at first unnerving, sibling relationship.

I saw Rose watch them in interest for a moment, then her gaze flicked to catch me watching her, and she smiled.

"I don't think I'm going to get used to them," She mumbled. "I wouldn't ever call Hugo 'it', or address a fellow student as 'oi, you' back at Beauxbatons."

I smiled back. "Trust me, I would call my sister 'it', but even I still don't think I've gotten over Oliver and Ruth."

"I think Hogwarts is going to be a very enriching experience this year, isn't it?"

I caught her gaze again and felt a smile spreading across my lips before I could stop it. Her smile was so infectious.

She was so unbelieveably pretty.

"Tell me about it," I mumbled to myself.

The rest of the train ride was uneventful, and so was the carriage ride up to the castle.

Rose lagged near the back of the group, quietly taking it all in. I watched her carefully to make sure she wasn't about to burst into tears and demand to go back to Beauxbatons, or freak out or anything.

Al, I think, had forgotten about her, so she was largely just experiencing this momentous occasion on her own, which I thought was wrong: it was an important step in her life, she shouldn't have to do it alone.

What warranted my involvement, I wasn't sure, but, nevertheless, by the time we reached the Entrance Hall I had made my way to the back of our group of stragglers to join her.

"So tell me honestly," I broke her out of her daze. "Has anything changed?"

She laughed a little, and her previously sombre expression became happy, which I took to be a good sign that she wasn't completely overwhelmed. "I think that bust of Nicholas Flammel had less chips in it."

"You know… I think you're right…"

"And there's a dent in the side of one of the carriages," She added.

"I think there's a piece of chewing gum on the floor that wasn't there last year," I added, trying not to smirk.

She elbowed me. "Now you're teasing me."

"Only a bit."

Before she had time to comment, and I had time to find out if she was anywhere near as good with comebacks as Ruth was, we walked into the Great Hall.

Rose came to a complete halt, staring up at the ceiling in surprise.

Al came and joined us then, as some of the others not in Gryffindor abandoned him to sit at their table.

"I forgot about the ceiling," She mumbled in fascination. "And the hall is much bigger than I remember."

"How does it compare to Beauxbatons?" Al asked, amused, as a group of third years stormed past us, almost knocking him over. We hurriedly made our way over to the Gryffindor table before we could get taken out by any more hordes of students.

"Well, it's completely freezing in here, there's cracks all over the place, cobwebs in every corner, about three quarters of the student body abusing the dress code, nobody seems to be following any sort of order or authority, you could cut the sexual frustration with a knife, and I'm being shoved back and forth like a tennis ball," she told us.

"So…"

I anticipated the grin before I saw it, because I was watching her eyes as she spoke, and they lit up mischievously.

"It's good to be back."

Hope you liked it. More to come soon! I might update regularly on a schedule (I've never done that before. How is it in organised world, anybody? :D) so the next chapter might be up next week some time. Promise I won't keep you waiting for too long!

Let me know if you liked this, and Rose. Thank you for reading! :D