Title: Like Water

Summary: Scorpius/Rose. We work through the differences that have haunted their families for generations. Set in their 7th year, 26 years after the war. Rated M for a reason.

Author's Note: Thanks everyone for the reviews. I'll try not to kill you with the cliff hangers and I'll try to get as much written this week because it's spring break and I've got the time, while I can. Normally I won't be able to put up a chapter a day. Hope everyone enjoys this chapter as much as the last. Reviews (and criticisms) are welcome!

Chapter 1:

August, 7th Year

Rose was late and frazzled. She practically slammed into the wall separating platform 9 ¾ from the rest of King's Cross station, and then she jogged towards the train dodging tearful first years and parents alike.

"Bloody hell," she muttered, though she knew it would make her mother wince if she could hear her. She began to try and lug the trunks onto the train.

"Need help?" she turned to the voice behind her. Albus was waiting, a kind look on his face. His robes with the green Slytherin emblem were already donned and the silver prefect badge gleamed from a fresh polish this morning.

"Yes please," Rose huffed, dropping the corner of her trunk and barely missing her toe. She wanted to cry, she was so frustrated. "I've no idea where Hugo went, and my mum and dad aren't here because of mum's stupid conference. And I overslept and had to park the car and use muggle money. And you're all dolled up and ready for the meeting while I don't even resemble a prefect let alone Head Girl!"

"Relax. Hugo's over there with Lily. Looks like he's trying to chat up her friend, and good luck to him because that one's looser than any girl on the corner of Knockturn Alley, so it shouldn't be that difficult."

Rose blinked, "Well, don't let him just go after her. You ought to warn him."

"Aw come on Rosie, give the boy a break."

"He's only in fifth year Albus."

"People said a lot about you in your fifth year Rose."

Rose blinked. That had hurt. "None of it was true though," she whispered.

Albus ran a hand nervously through his hair and then gave his cousin a one-armed hug. "I'm sorry," he told her, "I didn't mean to make you upset."

"S'ok," she told him and then gave a wry smile, "I was already upset. That was just the cherry on top."

He shoved the end of the last trunk in and picked up Rose's carry-on. "Come on, let's get you changed and into that meeting."

Rose followed him gratefully into the train.

Rose's instincts usually never steered her wrong, but she was completely unprepared for the rest of the morning. Though Al safely steered her to the loo to change, she told him to go on without her. She didn't want him to be late too.

However, after she changed and pinned her Head Girl badge to her robes, and combed out her hair that was still knotted from rolling out of bed and leaving quickly, she had a few more obstacles to face. Luckily most of them were things from her Uncle George's shop and she knew how to diffuse the situations rather quickly. If it hadn't been for the hex fight that was going on one car earlier than the one where her meeting was she might have been there at a respectable time. As it was, after sorting out the Slytherin and Hufflepuff fifth years and fixing what she could while telling the rest to go to the hospital wing before the feast, she was a spectacular forty-five minutes late. She made it to the Prefects Compartment just as they were all shuffling out. Rose groaned inwardly at the awfulness of her day so far.

Al's eyes were wide behind his glasses when he spotted her. "What happened to you?" he blurted out. Rose looked down confused and saw that there was a mess—the remains of a puking pastille were the on hem of her robes, a canary cream was somehow stuck to her sleeve, and there were various scorch mark on her robes caused both by the hex fight and her run in with her Uncle's (banned) fireworks. She looked absolutely horrid.

"I've had a bit of a run in with some—situations."

"Good lord woman, you look like you landed in a shelf at Wheezes."

She gave him a dry smile. "Just about. Is the Head Boy still in there? Is he angry with me? Who is it?" Rose was anxious. She knew if the situation were reversed she'd be furious at being left to deal with the prefects by herself this morning.

"Yeah, he's sorting out some of the meeting notes I think. Go on in, you'll see for yourself," he gave her the patented Potter-grin a look he and James used often which got them out of a lot. "I have to go meet Amelia."

"Amelia Bones?" Rose asked, her eyebrows raised.

"Yeah. Good luck," and before she could ask why she needed it, he was gone.

"Bugger," Rose muttered as she looked down at herself again. There was no real hope for it. George's joke shop wares were not made to come out of robes easily and it would take more than a scourgify to fix herself up. She sighed and rapped a quick knock on the door before letting herself in.

The Prefects Compartment was larger than most of the train's rooms—it was made to accomodate a large square table surrounded by plush chairs. There were two arm chairs at the head of the table where the Head Boy and Girl were expected to sit. Currently occupying one of these seats was her academic rival, Scorpius Malfoy. Rose was hardly surprised, he was one of the boys in her year she thought could have made the grades and had the good record to be nominated for the honor. Whether she was pleased, that was a different story. Their friendship ran from hot to cold back to hot again. One moment they could have an interesting deep conversation and the next they were fighting like their lives depended on it. Then would come the weeks of cold shouldering each other until one or the other needed a favor. Then the cycle started again. Sharing a dorm suite with him would make the cold shoulder all the more difficult to give and receive.

Malfoy had looked up when she entered the room. His usual smirk graced his mouth, probably, Rose mused, because of her appearance. "Weasley," he said, "Good of you to come."

Rose bristled, "I've had quite a morning Malfoy, as I'm sure you can see," she forced herself to take a deep breath before she laid into him more than was necessary. She tried to take the edge of out her voice as she said, "I'm sorry," in the swooshing release of her breath and "Please except my apology," congenially followed.

"Certainly." He stood up as he began to stack the papers he'd been writing on. As he scanned the top page, he dipped his quill in ink and began to scratch one more note, dipping his body towards the table. Rose realized how tall he had gotten. When they were first years they had been about the same height, because she was tall for a girl, having inherited her father's lanky frame, and he was short for a boy because he hadn't hit a growth spurt just yet. Now he was almost a head taller than her own 5'7". His hair had grown out a bit over the summer. He always kept it longer but now it hung about an inch and a half below his ears and flopped forwards into his eyes. No as he bent over the table he had to push it back out of his eyes. After finishing he looked up at her, "What?" he asked.

Rose realized she had been staring and felt her cheeks go pink. "Nothing."

Malfoy looked himself over. "I don't have anything on my robes do I?" As always they were respectable and expensive.

"I believe that would be me," Rose said, trying not to take his comment as a personal jab. Scorpius Malfoy often said things that Rose took as a personal affront that he only meant to be statements. Or at least that was what he'd told her once.

A rare smile pulled up the corners of his mouth. He placed the papers he'd stacked in a folder, pushed in his chair and walked towards her. As he walked he pulled his wand out of his pockets. Eight inches, solid oak with a Veela hair twined with a unicorn hair for the core, an odd combination Rose had thought one hair from a seductress, the other from the beast of innocents.

Before she could protest he'd trailed the end of her way at her and said clearly, "Scourgify." Rose grimaced. Now she'd never get the stains out. The only hope for them had been to owl George and have him send her a special anti-sticking potion he'd developed and offered free with his products (to prevent angry mums). Now they were barely fit for practicing for her N.E.W.T. potions exam.

When she looked at Malfoy again he had a thin line between his eyebrows placed there from confusion. Rose gnashed her teeth together and said, "You're not supposed to Scourgify candies from Weasley's Wizard Wheezes you git. Haven't you ever bought anything from there?!"

Malfoy's blonde eyebrows snapped together they way they always did when he got defensive. Right before they tore into a fight. "No, actually, I haven't," he told her coldly.

Rose huffed angrily, as she began to inspect her robes. The puking pastille had turned a nasty rusty green color which looked worse that it's original orange, and the canary cream had all but exploded leaving lemon yellow streams embedded into her sleeves. A bloody fucking mess for a bloody fucking day, she thought.

"Besides," Malfoy said loftily, his blue eyes still glinting angrily, "If you hadn't been so busy eating candies from your families joke shop maybe you would have made it on time to the meeting and wouldn't have had to worry about my damaging up your robes.

Rose opened her mouth, ready to spit fire. He too was prepared, his body set into a stance like marble. He was always the more steady one's in their fights. His words may have been as ridiculous as her own, but the entirety of her acted like a rocket with a lit fuse when mad. She would take on and burn everyone and everything that stood in her way.

Rose took an incredibly deep breath and forced herself to swallow the insult she wanted to hurl at him. Her dad would be a bit pouty at the prospect of her backing down from Malfoy, but her mum would be right proud of her swallowing down a few choice curse words.

Wordlessly, letting the heat of her eyes smolder her anger towards him, she snatched the meetings notes from his hand and she whirled away towards the door.

"By the way Weasley," he drawled calmly when she reached the door, "You've something purple dripping through your hair."

Rose slammed the door behind her so hard it rattled. Feeling like she might start to breakdown from the awful day she'd had she took a few deep breaths before walking quickly away. She'd never cried over anything Malfoy had said and she wasn't about to start now just because his insufferable nature had reared it's ugly head in the middle of an especially hard day.

Malfoy sat on the table hard.

He had been early. He had been so early that he may, in fact, have been the first student on the train. He'd been there an hour before any of the prefects were even expected to show up. And he'd done it because he had been certain that Rose Weasley, his fellow Head student would do the same and probably beat him to it. He was a fool.

He clenched and released his fists a few times, trying to free up the energy wound tight and coiled within him. He always felt wound up when she was around. If it wasn't forcing himself not to lose his cool with her, it was forcing himself not to reach and brush back the particularly unruly red curl that never, ever remained tucked behind her ear. He felt even more of a fool at thinking about it because it was that damnable red curl that had been the start of all this in the first place.

They'd had a fight in fourth year. They always had a fight in fourth year. After the disastrous turn their friendship had taken (which led to it's subsequent ending) at the end of their third year, there was no question as to why they argued in their fourth year. The truth was there wasn't a thing they wouldn't fight about. And while Rose ranted at him for kissing a girl in the hallway where anyone could see one night, he'd first had the urge to tuck the curl behind her ear after it had flown at him in the midst of her anger.

He'd been a mix of emotions when she hadn't shown up early that morning. Mostly he was self satisfied. The two of them were always looking for a leg up upon the other and at first he'd thought it would be an excellent way to mock her, to be sitting in the chair, relaxed, when she walked in with all of the prefects.

And then it had been doubt. He hadn't known for certain that Weasley was the Head Girl of course. It was always supposed to be some sort of pleasant surprise rubbish. But she was the only one who ever managed to best him in their academics and her record was cleaner than his was. But surely if she wasn't there when the first prefect entered it must of been someone else.

It wasn't until her cousin and his dorm mate for the past seven years, Albus Potter, walked in second to last and told the group that Rose was on her way, that Malfoy felt an odd emotion. It was a mixture of worry, anger, and tension that fired instantly through his veins. Worry because he knew that whatever had kept her must be important, and for as long as he could remember, even before his schoolboy crush had developed he'd worried over her. Anger because he felt like a fool, as always. And tension because he wasn't entirely sure how to lead a group of prefects without her. For a moment he'd felt like he'd need another draught of no-sick fix even though he'd had his usual dose to combat his motion sickness earlier.

And then she'd shown up, looking horribly disheveled and he'd been worried over her again. Being near her was like riding a bloody rollercoaster. Even dressed in filth he'd wanted her. When she'd glowered at him he'd felt his cock stir under his robes for Merlin's sake. So she wouldn't see he had to write a pretend note on the meeting's notes only to have his traitorous appendage betray him again when he realized she was staring. At him.

There was only one thing to do and that was to get her cleaned up, sit her down, have a nice chat about the meeting and what he hoped they could accomplish before shagging her senseless in one of the Head's chairs. With the last part staying a delightful dream to mull over later in his mind.

Instead it had all fallen apart when he'd tried to clean her up, which only caused her to become more sexy because she was instantly angry.

It also made him angry and indignant, however, because she was always angry over circumstances he couldn't control.

And so they had had their fight and he had said they exact thing he knew would make her angry enough to slam the door, even though he hated it when she slammed the door because it left him feeling empty, exempting, this time, the raging hard-on he know possessed.

Bloody perfect way to start off the seventh and final year of his days at Hogwarts.