"Rose, I don't like him!"

"Well during Duelling –"

"Like I had a choice! You pushed me!"

"You two having a fight?"

"Shut up Scorpius."

The pale haired boy put his hands up, as if defending himself from the nasty looks he was getting from Arianna and Rose. The girls turned back to each other, resuming their heated discussion. Scorpius had to jog to keep up with their pace.

"Why are you so angry? I merely pointed out you –"

"Why are you so deaf? Why can't you just drop it?"

"I would've dropped it if you hadn't turned on me like I'd insulted your pride or something! I don't see why you're being such a bit –"

"I have my reasons for being who I am!"

"It's just a crush –"

"Arianna has a crush?"

"SHUT UP SCORP."

"Okay, sorry, sorry…"

Albus joined the threesome; he didn't need Scorpius's warning look to know better than to intrude.

"Anyways, Albus was the one who first saw –"

"Whoa, what'd I do?"

"Did he? What'd he say?"

"Oh, just 'there goes another one of us going down the James path'."

"Did he now?" Albus cleared his throat uncomfortably. Arianna stopped abruptly, causing her friends to nearly crash into her.

"Look," she said, her voice calm, "I don't have crushes on people. Or – or I do, but it's never anything serious. I like them, for materialistic purposes, like you were complaining about, and then I get tired of them. Sick of them." She scanned the confused, worried looks on her friends' faces and felt like puking. Taking a deep breath, Arianna looked Rose in the eye, and said, as sincerely as possible, "Sorry", before taking off into the greenhouse. Rose stared after her, bewildered. Albus tapped his cousin on the shoulder, and they made their way into the classroom. Arianna had sidled up between two Slytherins she'd never even talked to before.

"Albus, what the hell –"

"Apparently she doesn't like me making my observations. Not everyone has such a perfect love life like you do."

Rose went red, Scorpius gagged.

"What?"

But Professor Longbottom appeared in front a miniature tree then, and the trio hurried to find a place to stand around the class table, leaving them no time to retort.


Arianna was miserable. Herbology, a class that she enjoyed thanks to Professor Longbottom's teaching, seemed to crawl on in the background as her own thoughts took over. She avoided looking at Rose, feeling a tight ball of guilt curling up in her stomach whenever she thought the redhead was looking in her direction. She hoped Albus had shut up, because for some reason, she felt dread at the idea of him making some accurate observations on her behaviour. She didn't even know Scorpius that well to feel comfortable being vulnerable in front of him.

Would Rose understand if she tried to explain herself? Arianna wasn't even sure she knew what was going on inside of her own head. Well she knew she'd gotten so disgusted with herself in the past that she'd forced her feelings away; she'd hated how she liked so many guys, used them for her own pleasure, then got sick of them one by one. She had decided she would stop her feelings from developing by cutting them off at the moment she could feel that first rapid beating of her heart.

Arianna knew she would probably have a crush on James Potter, that much wasn't that big of a surprise to her. What she hadn't anticipated was how she still wasn't over him; on the contrary, it almost felt like she liked him a tiny bit more every day. She'd never felt like this. It scared her.

It disgusted her how much time she was dedicating thinking about crushes.

At the very least, she owed an apology to her best friend.

It took her until dinner before Arianna got enough courage to make her way to the group of redheads at the Gryffindor table. She'd avoided everyone familiar for the whole day, skipping lunch to bury herself in the library. The only good thing that happened throughout the day was how she'd finally talked to the other people in her classes, and found that the pretension she had to pull finding the right words to say (which she usually detested) was a welcome distraction. It almost felt like no one treated her, to her face at least, as the "new girl who got everything she wanted" anymore, but more like the girl who'd pawned James in the first Duelling Club.

Arianna put her hands on the table, directly across from Rose. The redhead glanced up, Arianna opened her mouth, and before she could spill out the speech she'd been rehearsing Rose put up her hand.

"Be my partner in Defence Against the Dark Arts for the rest of the year?" Arianna gaped.

"Er –"

"Great. Try some of this soup, no idea what the heck they put in this, but it's totally awesome."

Arianna smiled shyly, catching Albus's eye, who rolled his eyes at her.

"Just so you know, Scorpius is acting like a fangirl towards you and James, and I kept my ungodly mouth shut." He whispered to her, making room for Arianna as she sat down beside him.

"I never told you to shut up…" Albus grinned slyly and Arianna ducked her head.

Of course Albus Potter could pretty much read her mind and see right through her.


"Sorry about how I acted today."

"You don't have to explain if you don't want to."

"I'm not."

"Oh. That's okay then."

"Goodnight Rose."

"'Night Ari."


The month of October passed by rather uneventfully, other than the mini-rivalry that had begun between Arianna and Rose. They and their friends never talked about it out loud, but it went unsaid that they were both helping, and competing against, each other with their classes.

"Aren't you two getting tired of this already?" Albus sighed when, after getting marks back on a Defense Against the Dark Arts essay, Ari and Rose were staring daggers at each other. This was one of the few assignments they hadn't helped each other on, and they both ended up getting an E on it.

"You said you were busy –"

"I was, I had Quidditch –"

"So did I –"

Scorpius was trying not to laugh. Albus rolled his eyes.

"Well this is way better than that one, or two, or half dozen times when one of you did better on something you'd helped each other on…"

"Shut up Albus." Rose snapped, playfully.

"Yeah Al. What'd you get?" Apparently Albus was against the nicknames Alby, Ally, Bus, and Dumbledore, so Arianna had to settle with "Al" ("Would you like to be called, say, Arrrrr? How 'bout Dumbledore's sister? Exactly.").

"Scorpius got an A." Albus said vaguely. Rose gasped mockingly.

"Shut up," the Slytherin told her, frowning, "Dad probably got pissed that I seemed to have forgotten the numerous Unforgivable Curses lectures he'd given me throughout the summer, and just to spite me, gave me the lowest mark I've gotten all year…"

"You poor thing," Rose said dismissively, "Alby-kins, what'd you get?"

"He got an O." Scorpius said, grinning at his best friend's exasperated look.

"You got a what?"

"Oooh look, Nargles! Hi James!" James, followed by his queue of sixth-year buddies, threw his younger brother a worried look as they came out of a Transfiguration classroom. Albus hurried up to them, striking up a conversation with one of his brother's cronies.

"You've been hanging out too much with Aunt Luna, Albus…" James muttered jokingly. Arianna turned to Rose, her eyebrows raised.

"Nargles? And just how many aunts do you guys have?" Scorpius chortled and Rose half-smiled.

"Family friend. Lily's middle name is Luna, named after Mrs. Luna Lovegood-Scamander."

Another war-hero namesake for Harry Potter's kin. Arianna knew that Albus Severus had been named after two Hogwarts headmasters, and James Sirius was named after his paternal deceased grandfather, and Harry's godfather. Rose explained that Victoire Weasley, Louis's older sister, had been named "Victory" for being born on the anniversary of the day the Second Wizarding War had been won, Fred Weasley was named after his deceased uncle, and Molly Weasley was named after her paternal grandmother. Sometimes Ari wished she was named after Albus Dumbledore's younger sister, despite having one too many n's in her name.

It wasn't the first time she wondered what went through her biological parents' minds when they'd given her her name.