AN: OH. MY. GOD. It's been so long and I'm sososososo sorry. I got a bit distracted by other things. Anyways, I'm back now! Also, two announcements: first, I created a Tumblr for this story in particular and Scorose in general. You can find me on Tumblr at scorosequeen. Please feel free to send me questions or feedback about the story, or to scold me when I go to long without updating. Second, I am seeking an accountability buddy for this story. And by "accountability buddy", I mean someone who will message me every couple of days and be all "HOW MUCH DID YOU WRITE TODAY? HOW MANY WORDS? YOU WROTE NOTHING? SHAME ON YOU! GO WRITE!" If you're interested in being that person, hit me up. ( My sister: No, you don't count. You bother me about this story enough.)
Okay, that's all for today. I'll let you read now. Thank you for sticking with me even though I suck at updating!
XoXoX
By the time Banshee was done playing, it was clear that they'd earned themselves several new fans. The Electric Emerald crowd, buzzed off of alcohol and dancing, cheered loudly at the end of the last song, then shouted with protest when Kyran announced that it was time to go. Beaming, the band played two more songs before finally wrapping it up.
"Oh my god," said Lily, as she made her way over to Rose and collapsed against her. "That was so much fun. I'm completely exhausted and I also want to run a marathon and kick someone in the face."
"You're suffering from the aftershock of the band-performing adrenaline rush," said Scorpius, appearing behind her. "It's a very serious problem." His blond hair was tousled and he was sweaty, but his eyes were bright and happy. It was adorable. Everything about him was adorable. Rose really needed to get a grip.
Lily laughed. "I'm going to go call Louis and tell him about this. He could use a good story to cheer him up."
"That's why she's the good cousin," said Rose, watching as Lily walked away, presumably seeking somewhere quiet where she could make her phone call in peace. Rose never called Louis, or any of her cousins. She never even called her mother (which didn't prevent her mum from calling her at least twice a week.) It wasn't because she didn't love them- she just really hated talking on the phone.
Scorpius shook his head. "You're all good cousins. If you were normal cousins, you would communicate only through glares and throw pasta at each other's heads. At least, according to Emer and Kyran."
"Big Irish family," Kyran explained, coming up next to them. "Sometimes tossing a handful of spaghetti into someone's face is the only way you can get them to pay attention to you."
"We're not talking about Christmas again, are we?" said Emer, right behind him. "Because that was one time and if you had to share a bedroom with Gabby you'd throw pasta at her face, too." She adjusted the placement of her silver nose ring with the touch of a finger.
"You threw pasta at someone's face?" said Dominique, looking impressed.
"One time!"
"I'll have to try that on Rose the next time she's being annoying," said Dominique, elbowing Rose in the ribcage.
"Ouch!" said Rose. "I'll have to try it on you the next time you decide to stab me with your bony elbows."
Kyran said something else, and then the rest of them jumped into a discussion about which type of pasta would make the best ammunition. Rose took advantage of their laughter and distraction to study them the way she would study a scene in a movie.
There was Dominique, as familiar to Rose as anyone in the world could be. Her short blonde hair was parted on the far left and half-falling into her eyes, and as Rose watched, she pushed it back with an impatient gesture, the silver rings on her fingers glittering in the colorful lights of the club. Every one of her movements, from the pushing of the hair to the way she threw her head back as she laughed, spoke of confidence and ease. Even a complete stranger would have been able to see her complete confidence in herself.
Next to Domi stood Emer, with her pixie cut and green eyes. She was a strange mix, thought Rose, equal parts daring and uncertain, a mixture of confidence and nervousness. She looked at her friends in a protective sort of way, but there was a certain fragility about her, too, like she was also in need of protection.
Kyran and Matt she didn't have a good enough read on yet, as she'd hardly spoken to either of them, but she thought that she liked them- Kyran with his easy stance and teasing manner, Matt flirting with every girl in sight.
And then there was Scorpius.
When she thought about it, she didn't know him terribly well either. And yet, despite this, she thought she had a pretty good read on him, too. The way he rested his hand lightly on Emer's shoulder when he spoke to her, his laughter as he talked to his friends, the way every single emotion showed on his face, the ease with which he spoke to strangers- everything about him was open and friendly and kind.
Rose really couldn't deny it. She liked him. A lot. She liked the sound of his laughter and the color of his eyes and his singing voice.
So why, exactly, did the idea of acting on those feelings freak her out so much? Why was studying together fine, but going on a date sounded like an impossible challenge? She wasn't sure. It didn't make sense. After all, Rose had had boyfriends before. Three of them, as a matter of fact. But not for several years, despite Dominique and Lily's persistent attempts at matchmaking. Sure, she'd had crushes, but never any that she had actually acted on.
Maybe, she thought, she was just a bit too cynical. Maybe observing her cousin's love lives ruined her for having one of her own. Maybe somewhere along the way, between Dominique's hook-ups and Al's disastrous dates and Teddy and Victoire's arguments, she'd decided that romance wasn't worth the bother.
And maybe that was why she find the idea of her and Scorpius being a thing both elating and nerve-wracking. He was just so nice. And Rose felt that, fundamentally, she wasn't a nice person. She was snarky and irritable and she slammed doors whenever she was annoyed by something. She wasn't made for relationships. She'd never really been in a good one. And she was afraid that Scorpius wouldn't like her very much once he actually got to know her.
Before she could dwell too much on that new and unpleasant realization, she noticed that the group around her was strangely silent. She blinked, emerging from her confused muddle of thoughts, and saw that someone else had joined them, a girl with shoulder-length brown hair. Though she was standing on the edge of the circle, with Kyran and Matt on either side of her, the girl had eyes for just one person.
Scorpius.
"I'm sorry for just showing up like this, Scor," the girl was saying. "I know I shouldn't have come without telling you."
"Damn right, Jessica, you shouldn't have," snapped Emer. "Get the hell out of here." She folded her arms across her chest and shot the brunette girl a look of pure poison.
Jessica. So this had to be the ex-girlfriend. The one who'd cheated on Scorpius for months before admitting it and breaking up with him.
Rose had imagined Jessica as someone wild and a bit crazy, someone who would speak loudly and get drunk and have lots of ear piercings, someone a bit more like Dominique. (Though Dominique had a strict no-cheating policy.) She'd thought that once Jessica was finished breaking Scorpius's heart, she would have moved on to someone else and completely forgotten about Scorpius.
But Jessica was none of those things.
In fact, she was one of the most well-put-together people Rose had ever seen. Her hair was straight and smooth, not at all frizzy or out of place. Her silver earrings matched a pendant that hung from her neck, and her bright red lipstick was not even a tiny bit smeared. And yet she still managed to avoid looking out of the place in the club.
"Jess?" said Scorpius, blinking at her. He seemed a little dazed. "What are you doing here?"
"You know what?" said Kyran. "Scorpius, I think we should go get you a drink."
"Great idea," said Emer, who was still glaring. "Maybe while you're doing that, Jessica can walk out to her car, drive away, and never speak to Scorpius again, ever."
Jessica ignored them both. "Look, Scor, I just really wanted to see you play tonight. You know how much I love your singing and your band. And I just wanted to make things up to you. All of it. I was awful, and I'm sorry, and I miss you. You're an amazing person and I can't stand the idea of never speaking to you again."
"Maybe you should have thought of that before cheated on him," said Emer. Rose couldn't believe that Jessica had the nerve to stand there without flinching while Emer looked at her with that amount of rage.
"Em," said Scorpius. He reached over and rested his hand on her arm, but his eyes stayed on Jessica. "You don't have to handle this for me, okay?"
"Scorpius, you can't possibly think-"
Emer broke off in the middle of her sentence as Kyran pulled her away from the others and began speaking to her in a low voice. Rose watched them for a moment, then turned her attention back to Jessica and Scorpius. The tension between them was intensely visible.
"Scorpius," said Jessica. "I know what I did was horrible."
"Yeah," said Scorpius, addressing her for the first time. "It was."
Jessica flinched. Clearly, this wasn't exactly the reaction she'd been expecting. Rose found herself wondering how many times the two of them had done this, how many times Jessica had stood in front of Scorpius looking beautiful and apologetic, knowing that he would forgive her and let her back into his life.
"I made a really bad choice," Jessica said, shifting her weight slightly, as though she was trying to regain her balance in the conversation. "I know that, and I'm so, so sorry."
Scorpius pressed his hands against his temples, fingertips tangling in his curly hair. "Jessica, what do you want from me?" His voice didn't sound angry or even resentful. It just sounded tired.
"I want to talk to you," said Jessica. "Have coffee, or something. I want to talk things over with you, so we can figure out what to do from here."
"This is what she always does," muttered Emer. Rose hadn't even realized that Emer was now standing next to her. "She ignores him for three weeks or tells him that they need a break or she says she has feelings for someone else as well as him and she just needs time to think about it, and then when he's finally getting over her, she shows up, looking all rational and full of sense, and says that they should 'just talk' about things. And then talking leads to them getting back together. But the way she plays it, she's never the one who suggests that they get back together. And then, the next time they fight about something, she says he pressured her into getting back together. She's a nightmare."
Rose shook her head slightly, but she was still unable to tear her gaze away from the scene in front of her. She wasn't sure that she could stand to see Scorpius make his decision, but she also couldn't take her eyes off of him.
Like he'd just read her mind, Scorpius glanced over at her, ever-so-slightly. Their eyes locked together for one long moment before he looked away.
He licked his lips. Jammed his hands into his pockets. Lifted his head. Spoke.
"Jess," he said. "I'm not going to do this anymore."
Pause.
"I was in love with you," he said.
Pause.
"And in retrospect, I don't really think I mattered that much to you," he said. "At all."
Jessica parted her lips to speak, but no words come out.
Scorpius kept speaking. "You broke my heart, and I'm tired of being heartbroken. So no, we can't talk this over. We've done that enough. I'm tired of being the person you come back to when you're bored." He lifted his head slightly. "We're done. Goodbye."
With that, he turned and walked away, his eyes set straight ahead. Emer, Kyran, and the others stared in awe for a moment before rushing after him. Rose stayed where she was for a second, unable to fully believe what had just happened, before hurrying after him with the others.
Together, the group made their way through the doors of the club and out onto the pavement of the parking lot.
"Holy shit," said Emer, coming to a stop and planting herself in front of Scorpius the moment they exited the building. "Did you just- did that actually just happen? Did you really just do what I thought you did?"
Scorpius ran his hands through his hair. "I think," he said, and then stopped. "I am fairly certain I just told Jessica Umbridge that we're no longer dating and we will not be dating ever again, because she was completely horrible to me for the entirety of our long and stupid relationship. At least, I think that's what I said. That's what I was trying to say. Is that what I said?"
"That's it," said Lily, pointing at him. "That is exactly what you said." Rose wasn't sure when Lily had returned from her phone call with Louis, but that seemed like a minor detail at the moment.
"Except when you said it, you sounded stone-cold and emotionally dead," said Matt. "It was pretty wild, man."
"I think I was stone-cold and emotionally dead," said Scorpius. "Jessica seems to have that effect on me." His face broke into a smile. "Oh my god, I can't believe I did that. I mean, I know we weren't together before, but now we feel extra not-together."
"Permanently not together?" said Emer.
"Permanently, eternally not together," said Scorpius.
Rose said nothing. She was drinking in all of it: the chill of the air and the pride as Emer looked at Scorpius, the smiles on everyone's faces and the new confidence in Scorpius's eyes.
Emer flung her arms around Scorpius and hugged him tightly. "I am so freaking proud of you. So proud."
"Emer, you were amazing in there," said Dominique, laughing. "You were like a super fierce, hella pissed-off pixie."
"That about sums her up," said Kyran.
"You know what I think this calls for?" said Emer.
"Celebratory Scorpius-broke-up-with-his-girlfriend drinks?" suggested Dominique.
"Pizza?" said Matt, looking hopeful.
"Seconded!" said Kyran.
"Possibly some chocolate-chip cookies," said Lily, nodding.
"Yes, yes, all of that," said Emer. "But first, this calls for a group hug."
"You think everything calls for a group hug, you nerd," said Kyran, but even as he spoke, he stepped up to Emer and Scorpius and flung his arms around them.
"Why the hell not?" said Dominique. She moved forward wrapped her arms around the others. "Let's hug, people-I-met-six-hours-ago."
"Hey, you're our official stage manager now," said Matt, joining the hug.
"Yeah, seriously, there's no way we're letting you get out of that," said Emer.
"And Lily's your guitarist," said Dominique, pulling Lily into the hug. "By the way, Lil, I sent a video to James and he says your band might actually be better than his."
"All bands are better than his," said Lily.
And then it was only Rose standing on the outside of the hug, shivering slightly in the chilly air.
It was Scorpius who noticed this first, lifting his head above the others, his gray eyes meeting hers even as his friends tried to squish him to death.
"Come on, Rose, get in on this awkwardness," he said. "I promise we won't kill you."
Rose shook her head. "I don't really do group hugs."
"Oh, shut up," said Dominique. "You so do group hugs." She grabbed Rose's arm and yanked her into the group hug. Before Rose could even process what was happening, she was being squished to death, encircled by a circle of people so tangled together, it was hard to tell who was who.
"Can't breathe," Rose squeaked, but it was of no use. They only squished her more, until she was gasping with laughter and the cold of the night was entirely blocked out by the arms of her friends. Dominique was trying to tickle her and Kyran was saying that he could feel his masculinity disappearing and Scorpius's chin was poking into her shoulder and the stars overhead were bright and clear, and in that moment she felt nothing but happiness, unshakable and endless.
XoXoX
AN: Thanks for reading! Leave a review and lmk how I did. Or scream at me for taking so long to update. Your choice.
