Chapter 4: The Game
Rose's POV
One more night with Malfoy, I kept thinking. One more night. Then I could go back to my peaceful common room (which was actually his common room as well…), my dorm, my bed, my studies…and just ignore the ignorant scum that was Scorpius Hyperion Malfoy!
Taking my wet, cold hair out of my face, I dredged up the stairs with Alice. She was talking about her summer job on the Quibbler magazine—she was a junior writer, apparently.
I made a little snorting noise in the back of my throat. "And what do you write about? The ever foreboding presence of nargles in Diagon Alley?"
Alice hit me lightly with the back of her hand. "Actually, I write a little piece about strange muggle activities. Did you know they try to contact aliens with little pieces of metal they call—cell phones?" Alice lowered her voice as if it was a highly confidential topic.
At this, I could no longer contain my laughter. "Alice! That's not what cell phones are used for!"
"And how would you know?" she asked rather grumpily.
"My mum's whole family consists of Muggles! I've seen a cell phone or two, and their mostly for sending texts and calling."
"Sending text?" Alice inquired. "Why would you need a cell phone if you can just get an owl to deliver handwritten text?"
I rolled my eyes, knowing she wouldn't be able to understand. "Tell your readers what you like, Alice. I'm sure the Muggleborns are getting a kick out of it anyway."
Overhearing the last part of our conversation, Malfoy suddenly was beside me, falling in step with me and Alice.
"Muggleborn like yourself, Weasley?" he sneered.
"Oh, shut up. You knew full well my mother is a muggleborn, not me." I snapped at him.
"Just as bad," Malfoy intoned, apparently not backing down from the ridiculous mockeryhe was throwing at me.
"Go ahead, Malfoy, call me a mudblood already, like your father did before you. I'll handle you Hermione Granger style." I smirked, crossing my arms and standing at the landing to look up at him.
Quite unexpectedly, Malfoy's face darkened a little, and he looked as though he had swallowed a rather large bug.
"I would never call you or anyone else a mudblood." He said darkly.
Taken aback, all I could do was stare at him as he stared at me. After a few moments it got awkward, I blushed, Malfoy blushed, and he turned around dramatically to go up the stairs ahead of us.
I knew my eyes were practically bugging out of my head as I watched him go. I turned immediately to Alice. "What was that all about?" I asked her incredulously.
Alice shrugged, looking at me as though the whole incident was a completely normal conversation passed between Malfoy and I. "Obviously Scorpius wants you to know he's not the same person as his father."
"But he is the same person as his father. That's his thing. 'Let's see how much I can bug Rose Weasley by pretending to be my father!'" I countered.
Alice gave me a knowing look, which I found highly irritating. "Pretending." She said simply, then walked up the stairs, leaving me alone with my confused thoughts. He was the same person as his father, and his grandfather! He was a Malfoy. That's what my father had been telling me all my life.
But something in the back of my mind nagged, what if he's not the same?
I wanted to go to bed by 10:30. We had a huge day tomorrow. I had changed into my soft, baby blue pajamas and everything—and Alice into her pink shorts and oversized Weird Sisters T-shirt. Victoire, Dominique, and Roxanne were talking in hushed voices in the corner, their beds all squished together like they were at a slumber party. Alice, Lily and I had our beds together too, but we decided to drape a blanket between our two sections of the room so the other girls wouldn't keep us up.
Lily, however, was refusing to go to sleep.
"C'mon, Rose! One of the few days of the year where all of us Wotters are together, and you want to go to sleep at 10:30?! That's ridiculous! Come, let's go get Al and think of something fun to do! At least until midnight!" she was saying, throwing her long tangerine hair across her shoulders like some model in Witch Weekly.
I turned to Alice, who was, as usual, looking off into space. "Alice," I asked, taking her away from her daydream. "Don't you want to go to bed?"
"Mmm…" she thought for a moment. "Personally, I can sleep whenever. I'm always sleepy sleepy, but I could stay awake too! Whatever you guys want." She turned back to her nails, inspecting them without really seeing them.
Sighing in frustration, I said to Lily, "Well take Alice and do something with the boys, but I'm going to bed—"
As the words left my mouth, our bedroom door clambered open, and a flannelled Albus Potter stood with a wicked gleam in his eye.
"No one is going to bed just yet." He said authoritatively.
I grumbled. "Albus, I will go wake up my mother, so help me—"
"Your mother is currently incapacitated from firewhiskey." Albus said shortly. I stared at him in horror. He only smiled wider. "Hugo and I switched her cup."
My "innocent" little brother peeked out from behind Albus then, smiling shyly at me. "Sorry, Rosie. I just didn't want you go and waking up mum. Albus said we were going to play a game!"
Just then, Dominique joined our group. "What did you have in mind, Potter?"
"An excellent game me and James came up with!" he said delightedly, now that I could no longer refuse to participate. James came in our bedroom then, sitting at the edge of Lily's bed. She pushed him roughly to get up, but he was so large and she was so tiny that she just ended up in a pile on the floor.
James was followed by Teddy, Louis, Fred, and Scorpius (gag).
"Nice space, ladies!" Fred said, tearing down my blanket-wall. Everyone took their seats, the girls bunching together and the guys forming a semi-circle around us (with the exception of Teddy and Victoire—who were practically engaged already and could hardly ever keep their hands off of one another. Gag!)
As Scorpius sat down next to Al, he smirked at me, eyeing my pajamas.
"Nice jammies, Weasel." He said. He was also wearing flannels, and a black jumper—which kind of made him look like an evil vampire because of the contrast with his white skin.
"I could say the same for you, Malfunction."
With a loud clap of his hands, James called us to attention. "Now, people, this game was made up entirely by me and my genius brother, Albus Severus." The two brothers smirked at each other. "We mixed up three muggle games, would you rather, spin the bottle, and truth or dare." James produced a glass bottle with a "Weasley's Wizard's Wheezes" label facing out so everyone could see. Ah, one of Fred and George's joke sodas. The bottle was empty, of course, and he set it down in the middle of the circle so everyone could see. He then took out a deck of cards and placed a joker, queen, king, and ace around the bottle. "Now, we all take turns spinning the bottle. Whichever card the bottle lands on determines if you will be asked a 'would you rather' question, a truth, or a dare. The king means the spinner may choose any they want. The queen is truth. The ace is dare, and the joker is 'would you rather'. The person who spins turns to the person next to them to ask the question. Now, let's go clockwise, beginning with Al!"
When James sat down, the room was dead silent, waiting for Albus to spin. As he did so, everyone held their breath. The bottle landed on the joker.
"Okay, Rosie," Albus said, turning to me. "Would you rather…be sorted into Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff?"
I made a small snort, as if it should be obvious. Of course I was in Gryffindor, but if I had to choose between the two… "Ravenclaw." I said easily.
Alice smiled widely at me—she was in Ravenclaw.
When it was my turn to ask Alice something for truth, I goaded her into telling me an embarrassing story—of a time she laughed so hard she peed.
Alice spun, and the bottle landed on dare. "Lily," Alice said slowly, thinking. "I dare you to…fly your mother's broom around the yard! Right now!"
Of course, always the life of the party, Lily was willing to do this dare. We all watched out the window as she flew around, showing off her skills by doing some turns and flips.
It was an extremely fun game, I could give James and Albus that. However, it was exceedingly difficult to find questions to ask one another that we didn't already know. I knew practically everything about Albus and Hugo, Alice and Lily, although Dominique and Victoire sometimes still remained mysteries to me. We went around the circle several times, and found out that Teddy would rather eat a flabberworm than ride a muggle "roller coaster." Louis' childhood crush was Rita Skeeter (really Louis?), if Alice had one wish, she said she wished she could play or understand Quidditch at all (I had a feeling this was a stab at Albus for being so obsessed with Quidditch all the time), and Al was forced to tell us an extremely embarrassing story in which he called professor McGonnagall "mum"!
For me, the dares were the funniest part. To see shy little Alice get dared to tickle my dad in his sleep, and to see Hugo dared to call James "Your Highness" for the rest of the week was pure gold. But all that fun ended when we were finally wrapping the game up, and Albus had his last turn for the night. He spun the bottle, putting an extra umph into it, and we all waiting on baited breath to see what horrible embarrassment I would be subject to this time.
It was a dare.
Albus had a very evil glint in his eye, and for a moment I began to question his place in Gryffindor. He was going to make me do something I would never be able to forgive him for.
"Rose Weasley, we've all seen you yell at Scorpius until you're blue in the face." He announced.
Wait, what? C'mon Al, just get on with my dare! I'm ready to go to bed!
"And Scorpius," he said, turning to his surprised best mate. "We've seen you deliberately do dumb stuff like push Rose into the pool or set her robes on fire just to make her mad," he continued. "Maybe all this animosity would stop if I dared Rose…to kiss Scorpius."