For a few hours after the Scorpius incident, Rose seemed to be in some sort of mystical, hazy state, a million questions swirling through her head, whizzing and melting together as though they were boiling in some sort of cauldron. Rose felt as if she were on autopilot; just sitting in a squashy Gryffindor armchair, as her relatives chattered around her, nodding her head and laughing at appropriate times.
What the hell was that, anyway? That was a completely new Scorpius she had seen – in her sixth year of knowing and hating that boy, not once had he ever acted like that. And Scorpius wasn't that good an actor – it was bewildering. She just couldn't understand it, couldn't get her head around any of it – for once, Rose, one of the smartest witches of her year, was stumped. This was a problem she couldn't solve, something completely illogical that had thrown her straight into the deep end.
She was still wedged deep into these thoughts as James clambered through the portrait hole, looking as if he was going to curse someone at any moment.
"Lily!" He barked, storming towards the small cluster of relatives. Albus, who had been quietly been formulating Quidditch formations on a roll of parchment, looked up in alarm, recognising the angry tone. Hugo, his mop of ginger hair coloured pink because he lost a bet, shifted position from sitting on the top of his armchair with his feet on the seat cushion, to actually sitting in it properly, trying to blend out of sight of James' anger – but, fortunately for everyone else, the eldest Potter only had eyes for his little sister, the redheaded fourth-year who lounged in her own armchair, watching her brother arrive with a slightly amused expression.
"Yeah?"
"What were you doing with Ritchie Macmillan on the fifth floor, behind the statue of the-"
"Excuse me." Lily interrupted coolly. "What were you doing, spying on me with the Marauder's Map? I told you, if you carry on exploiting that thing I will tell Dad you took it from his desk."
"I have every right to know what my sister-"
"No, James, you don't!" Lily's tone rose dangerously. Hugo, Rose and Albus had frozen, not wanting to make a move or a sound which either of the Potters could latch onto and lash at them for. Lily and James were ferocious beasts when they were arguing...
"I don't want my sister going around and-"
"And what?"
"You've been out with... how many guys is it, now?"
"It's none of your business, James! Keep your nose out of my personal life!"
"He's one year older than you!"
"He's a prefect, you should be satisfied!"
"Well, I'm not! Next time I see that Macmillan-"
"You won't be doing anything next time you see Ritchie, thank you very much. And besides, at least I have proper relationships... I don't have one-day flings with countless girls like you, James!"
James rarely blushed, but now his face was scarlet, clashing awfully with his messy black hair.
"I don't-"
"Oh, don't lie to me." Lily said coldly, crossing her arms and narrowing her eyes. "Everyone knows you've never had a relationship lasting more than a week! You're a player, James, just taking advantage of the fact that girls throw themselves at you because of Dad's reputation-"
"Oi! I'll have you know that I went out with Georgia Brown for three weeks, thank you very much."
"Oh, big woop." Lily rolled her eyes. "You can't attempt to ban me from seeing anyone when you go around flaunting yourself and dating five girls in a week-"
"That's just an exaggeration!" James said hotly, but everyone knew that Lily had won the argument – for now. James pushed a second-year from an armchair, pulled it towards his siblings and cousins, and flopped into it, muttering words like "punch", "Macmillan" and "ridiculous". Lily tossed her hair and shot Rose a smile, before turning back to her star-chart for Astronomy.
"You okay, Rose?" Albus raised an eyebrow at her, his expression clearly saying I-know-you're-not-so-don't-lie.
"Yeah, I'm fine." Rose plastered a fake grin on her face and spoke unnaturally high. Damn, she'd blown it now – Albus was going to wriggle it out of her.
"Spill." He said simply, dotting a line from one of his miniature people on the parchment to another.
He looked up, and Rose couldn't think of what to say as his bright green eyes locked onto hers. He'd find out anyway – Albus was her best friend, he knew her inside out; if there was one person she wouldn't be able to hide it from any more, it would be Albus.
But what was there to hide, anyway? Nothing. There was absolutely nothing that he didn't know already – Rose and Scorpius hated each other. He'd been bugging her lately. And that... that incident at the portrait hole, it hadn't really been anything, had it? All Scorpius had done was stammer a few sentences about not understanding her – which was fair enough. Why did she feel like something huge and eventful had happened in her life? It was nothing. There was nothing going on.
"Seriously, Al, it's nothing." She shrugged. It was mainly true...
Albus contented himself for now, but Rose knew he'd ask later. James was too busy wallowing in anger to notice, and Hugo was working on getting his hair colour back to normal – every time he uttered the incantation and tapped his head with his wand, the pink hair had turned to a different drastic colour: blue, purple, green...
Rose muttered the same incantation and waved her wand lazily, so her little brother's hair turned back to his shiny, normal ginger colour. Albus didn't notice the cloudy gaze she shifted into again, and she dived back into her thoughts.
"Weasel!" The Defence Against the Darks Arts classroom was filled with wisps of silvery vapour – students desperately tried to conjure Patronuses. This sort of advanced magic, Rose's mother had told her, wasn't introduced into the curriculum until recently, after much deliberation with the Minister (Kingsley Shacklebolt, who popped round for dinner sometimes), the Auror department, and the Hogwarts' Board of Governors.
Rose jumped; the silver mist that had begun to take shape into an animal disintegrated as she lost concentration. She whipped around, angry, her red hair flying – expecting to see Scorpius' thin, blonde form smirking at her, she received a double shock when a brunet boy with wonky teeth stood there.
"Who are you?" Rose asked, before she could stop the words; dragging up snatches of information from the back of head, she recognised this boy as Jeremy Flint, a Slytherin who was quite unpleasant towards anyone who wasn't in his own House.
"Jeremy. Jeremy Flint. Haven't we met?" He stuck out his hand and smirked at her. Unimpressed, Rose didn't shake his hand, letting it drop to his side, her eyebrows raised in slight distaste.
"Why are you calling me Weasel?" She asked coolly, a small frown appearing on her face. Her arm was still raised in conjuring-Patronus-mode, her head twisted around over her shoulder, but the discomfort wasn't bothering her at all; 'Weasel' was a name specially used by Scorpius, and only Scorpius. The Weasleys and Potters barely got called names anyways, but on the rare occasions that Rose was targeted by playful banter, the name 'Weasel' was never uttered by anyone other than the annoying blonde that she had had a hate-hate relationship with for years.
"Can I not?" Flint looked slightly shocked – but he was clearly mocking her, the shimmer in his eyes both spiteful and playful.
"What do you want?" Rose's patience was quickly melting away. The tone of her voice was already mutating into a harsh snap... she'd never spoken to this guy before, why was he suddenly swaggering around her and – and –
And then it hit her, why she was a tad more annoyed than she should have been. He was acting like Scorpius... Exactly like Scorpius, except without that certain edge of superiority and scorn and Scorpius-ness that only he could manufacture.
"I'm only introducing myself to you." Flint said, attempting the offhand tone of Malfoy. What the hell was going on? Had Malfoy sent him to do this as some sort of weird prank? Because this was both painful for her to watch, and humiliating for Flint to carry out. Now that she had worked out who his behaviour was based on, it was terribly inadequate and plain awful...
"I'm Jeremy Flint. Would you like to go to Hogsmeade with me?" There was a trip the weekend after next, the first trip since school started, and Rose had intended to spend it with her group of cousins and Hugo, as usual. Occasionally, one of them (usually Lily or James) would go off to spend it with a certain someone, but normally they stuck together, as always. Would Rose split from them to spend it with this hateful boy who liked to push Hufflepuffs down toilet bowls? Not a chance.
"No, thank you." She said primly, turning her head away from him and mustering the concentration to conjure her Patronus once again. A happy memory... a mixture of Albus' grateful smile as she took his essay, and Hugo's comical hair-colour situation.
"Expecto Patronu-"
"Why don't you want to go with me?" Flint flitted into her vision, looking disgruntled. She sighed as she lowered her wand.
"Because, Flint, I don't like you."
"Why?"
"Because you're not a very nice human being, Flint." Rose said calmly. "You throw Ravenclaws into the lake, you attempt to hex Gryffindors into oblivion, including my brother. It's a pity Lily's too fiery for you to handle." Flint opened his mouth to respond, but Rose shushed him but holding up a finger. "The only people you're nice to are Slytherins. You barely give anyone the respect you think you're entitled to. You stupidly try to pick on people who are much bigger and smarter than you, for example, my cousin James. How many times have you tried to jinx him? About six? And how many times have you succeeded? None. You're arrogant, selfish, and just plain distasteful –"
"Scorpius is all that." Flint said hotly. This had some sort of effect on Rose – like a hot spear had been shot in slow-motion into her stomach.
"So?"
"Well, you're quite obviously attracted to him."
Rose's hot-spear feeling dissolved at once, and she laughed.
"Oh, please! Everyone knows that's not true. Are you really as stupid as you look? It's a fact that me and Scorpius have hated each other for-"
"Hate. Yeah, sure, 'hate'." Flint dragged huge air quotes through the air with his fingers, before sweeping away, clearly disgruntled and unhappy.
Rose quickly scanned the room. Nobody had overheard the little spat – but, she realised, there was one person who always picked up on the negatives in her life and sauntered over purely to enhance them. Scorpius – where was he? He was in a lot of her classes, Gryffindors and Slytherins inexplicably paired together for a lot of subjects... Albus had gone to the toilet, which was lucky; he would have noticed the hot-spear feeling in her stomach, and would have guessed that something was up. But where was Scorpius? Come to think of it, Rose hadn't seen Scorpius since the incident at the portrait hole... which was odd, because Scorpius was like a constant presence in her life. Where was he? Why had he skipped classes? He hadn't been in Potions either... how had she not noticed?
Wait. Why was she expecting herself to notice? It's not like she wanted Scorpius constantly taunting her, throwing scorn and being a flirt at exactly the same time. It had always been an irritant.
Confused, Rose raised her wand again. But for the rest of the lesson, she couldn't concentrate hard enough to produce more than a few wisps of white mist.
Rose got up early the next day, for a reason that she didn't even know. In a haze of brightness, heavy eyelids and soft robes, she got dressed, ran a brush through her hair, grabbed her school bag and went down for an early breakfast.
There were a few other clumps of early risers, and surprisingly, Lily had just wiped clean a plate of toast, getting up just as Rose sat down beside her.
"What are you doing up so early?" Rose asked, raising an eyebrow and starting to spread marmalade on a piece of toast.
"Oh, umm..." Lily scanned the Great Hall quickly. "Well. I don't really like to upset James, the little hypocrite. So I told Ritchie to meet me before James has woken up... it might give him a better peace of mind." Lily shrugged and walked out. She seemed a bit off... but maybe that was because of the constant arguing with James. Rose pushed that to the back of her mind, eating toast and reading through her Herbology textbook at the same time. Slowly, people began to trickle in for breakfast, and her cousins and Hugo flopped into seats around her, drowsily stuffing food into their mouths before heading towards their first classes.
Again, Scorpius was absent from Potions. Where the hell had he been these last few days? He surely wasn't in the hospital wing – there would be girls crying all over the place, crowds of his cronies pouring into the hospital wing to lavish him with presents... no, he was simply avoiding the lessons. Avoiding her? No. What happened at the portrait hole... that was insignificant. It was nothing. Really. It could easily be forgotten... in fact, she had pretty much thrown it out of her head, not looking back at it again. But then, why was something gnawing at her insides?
Still in a confused daze, Rose worked her way throughout the school day – even the teachers sensed that something was wrong; the concentrated glint in her eye had faded, and she just seemed to be stuck in another world, unbeknown to her that she strongly resembled Luna Lovegood at this present moment in time. Her thoughts were filled with the half-muttered incantations and potions ingredients she was supposed to be focusing on, that certain shade of blue that she had last locked her own eyes on over a simmering cauldron a few days ago, the moment when Scorpius looked pitiful, desperate, even –
"Sorry I'm late, Sir." A voice pierced her thoughts clearly and sharply – before she had even turned her head, she knew who it was; not just by the oh-so-familiar voice and cocky tone, but the fact that several girls had erupted into giggles, a few even turning their vinegar into pink champagne instead of wine.
Scorpius Malfoy paused in the doorframe, shooting a sheepish grin at the Professor, who tutted and docked ten points from Slytherin, beckoning for the blond to take his seat. Scorpius, in his usual garb of an untucked shirt, loosened tie and ruffled hair, sauntered past several girls and took his place at a bench behind Rose's. She refused to look at him, as always – geez, did these girls have no shame? She glanced scornfully in their direction – they were giggling among themselves and shooting glances towards Scorpius as he unpacked his bag, but he wasn't paying attention to anyone, that irritating smirk still plastered over his face.
A wave of relief swept over Rose – wait, what the hell? Why was she feeling relieved? Nothing had happened to him! She had no reason to feel relieved about anything! It wasn't like Malfoy had just escaped a Hungarian Horntail – and even if he had, why would she care? He was a detestable, worthless little slug. Taking a deep breath and slamming her eyes shut, Rose opened them again, and turned her vinegar into wine with one swish of her wand. As her Professor was, once again, delighted at her work, and she'd earned twenty points for Gryffindor, she finally felt normal, for the first time in a couple of days.
But this was so weird. She hated Scorpius, and he hated her... why was he able to control her emotions like this? And it wasn't even her... it was just her subconscious, some tiny hidden part of her, that was feeling relieved or... or... whatever that emotion was. But it meant nothing. It meant nothing.
Rose distracted herself but watching, slightly amused, as Albus tried to turn his own vinegar to wine. A swish, an incantation; not wine, exactly... milk. Another swish. Orange juice. The next swish was aggravated, and it didn't help; the orange juice turned to pickle. Exasperated, Albus squeezed his eyes tightly shut and poured all of his concentration into the next try –
"Alright, Weasel?"
Rose jumped, sending the goblet of wine flying – it fell to the floor with a clatter. Hurriedly muttering Reparo and wiping the floor clean of the wine, Rose looked up, biting the inside of her cheek, to face Scorpius, who was leaning on the front of her bench, his arms crossed, looking at her over his right shoulder.
"What?" She responded acidly; Scorpius chuckled.
"Really, Weasel, you've got to improve your manners."
"Wha – whe – huh?" Rose spluttered, completely aghast; her wand shot pink sparks into the air. Why was he acting so... so... so normal? He had totally wrecked the cocky facade at the portrait hole. How could he snap back to being this character, right now, in front of her? Or... or was this his real character? If so, what was that back of the portrait hole?
I thought you said that what happened at the portrait hole was insignificant... not worth remembering... a little voice said in the back of her head. As Scorpius looked at her, eyebrows slightly raised, she argued with her other conscience; It's not! But this doesn't exactly make sense, does it?
Pft.
What do you mean, pft?
After this sentence, Rose realised she was acting crazy.
"What's up with you, Weasel?" Malfoy asked casually, swiping her goblet off her desk and twirling it in his fingers. Rose spotted a cluster of girls across the room, some gazing at Scorpius longingly, some shooting her death stares.
"Oh, get lost." She snapped at him, infuriated. He acted so normal, yet so annoyingly, in pure Scorpius fashion. It was unfair. It was unfair how she wasn't able to solve a simple illogical problem like him, unfair how girls were envious of her for something she didn't want to be envious for, did she like having this sort of relationship with him? It was mutual dislike, yes, but still close, nevertheless. But no, she didn't want it.
She didn't want it!
For some reason, she had to repeat it in her head a few times before the phrase stuck.
"Geez, someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed this morning." Scorpius said dryly, as the class started packing their bags to leave.
"Where have you even been?" The words were out of her mouth before she could stop them. She didn't care. So why was she even asking? He could have been at the bottom of the Lake with the Giant Squid for all she cared.
He stared at her for a couple of minutes before answering.
"Nowhere. Not that it's any of your business. Why do you care?"
"I don't." Rose said quickly – too quickly. She knew she'd fluffed that moment up... so, to avoid any more embarrassment, she tugged Albus (who was still trying to turn vinegar into wine) along with her and left the classroom for her next lesson.
