Chapter Ten
Lily felt like everyone was looking at her, even though they probably weren't. She sat across from Scorpius for the first time in several days, nervous to look up at him. She didn't want to talk first, so they sat in silence for twenty solid minutes.
"I'm not mad at you, Lily. I just don't understand why you hid it from me," Scorpius finally said, as if continuing a conversation they weren't having. "I tell you pretty much everything. Even before… I told you pretty much everything about me. It just sucks to feel like I don't mean as much to you."
"It's not that at all," Lily said quickly, looking up at him. His eyes looked sad. Scorpius could be read like a book, it was true. "I wanted to tell you." Actually a lie. But under any other circumstances – if she had lost her virginity in a conventional way – she would have told him.
"Then why didn't you?"
"I didn't want to hurt your feelings."
"You're lying to me. Why are you lying to me?" Scorpius said, his lip curling at the corner in a way that made him look amused. But really, he was hurt.
"Fine! I didn't want to tell you. I didn't think it mattered," Lily said. It did matter. It was another lie, and he could tell.
"Who was the other person? Was it someone I know?" Scorpius asked.
"Yes," she sighed. "It was Lysander."
"Lysander Scamander?" he prodded, his eyes narrowing. She nodded. "No, it wasn't. Who was it? Please don't lie again."
"Does it really matter that much to you? Do you really need to know?" Lily asked, getting frustrated. She clenched her fists in her lap, biting her nails into black fabric. When had she become a pathological liar? Surely this wasn't who she was.
Scorpius paused. He looked away from her, breathing deeply through his nose, obviously reaching for some semblance of patience. Finally: "No. No, I guess it doesn't matter."
They sat in silence while Lily held back tears. She was so tired of fighting. This reunion was not how she had been hoping it would go.
After ten minutes of silent eating, Scorpius bid her goodbye, got up, and left.
Barely five minutes later, Roxy slid into the seat next to her, tearing into a piece of bread.
"Yikes, that looked awkward. What happened?" Roxy asked, straddling the bench and facing Lily.
"I don't think he trusts me," Lily said. And he doesn't have any reason to.
"About that Rose-trying-to-kill-you thing?" Roxy scoffed. "I want to prove that bitch is evil. Like, I love her, and she's family, but this whole Scorpius thing is making her mad! What does she think she's accomplishing, scheming with Dom? It's absolutely bat shit."
"Rox… stop," Lily said. "You seriously should just stop. I did something shitty, okay? I was in the wrong in this whole Scorpius situation."
"That doesn't mean you deserve to be persecuted for it!" Roxanne shot back, wide-eyed. "She should take the high road. Rose is smart; she has no excuse for acting like this. As for Dominique, I honestly have no faith in her anymore. And you and Scorpius… everyone can tell you two are crazy about each other. Rose and Scorpius were never like that."
"Don't be ridiculous. Yes, they were. They held hands and kissed in the hallway all the time," Lily said, rolling her eyes. She remembered reading Scorpius' journal, all of the little sketches of Rose with her big, curly hair scratched into inky spirals. He had really loved Rose, there was no denying that.
"But it wasn't the same. Okay? You two make more sense. I can see it, and Albus can see it. That's why he hasn't gone all protective brother on you."
Lily scoffed because of what she didn't know: that he already had. There probably wouldn't be any more harmony on that front.
"Whatever fight you two are in, you need to make it right," Roxy said.
"I need to? Why do you think this is my fault? Why do I have to fix it?" Even though I just admitted it was my fault.
"I don't know why I even try," her cousin sighed, getting up and stalking back over to the Hufflepuff table.
Roxy was right. She and Scorpius were different.
Rose stared up at the gauzy canopy that hid her crying form from the rest of the room. Tears slid down either side of her face, and had been consistently, ever since she came to the horrible realization that it was over. Officially and completely, devastatingly, over.
She and Scorpius would never make love again, or kiss again, or hold hands again, or probably even smile at each other again. She had ruined it. If he didn't know she was one of the co-conspirators behind Lily's fall, he would figure out soon enough.
While trying to figure out the person she really was, she became someone awful. As much as she loved Dominique and valued her friendship, she didn't want to be like Dominique. It wasn't anything personal against her cousin – in fact, she really didn't want to be like anyone else, at all. When she pictured each of her female cousins: Roxanne, Dominique, Victoire, Lily, Lucy, and Molly, she pictured six very different people. They were each one in a million. Rose felt utterly simple compared to them. Even compared to Lucy, who was mousy and found her favorite hobby in claymation. At least it gave her some character.
Even when she had caught Scorpius in bed with Lily, she still had the hope that he was just caught up in the excitement of something new – that he'd soon realize how good he had it, and how Lily was just a detour from the main path that would lead him back to Rose. But as time passed, and Lily and Scorpius became more brazenly public and happy in their relationship, Rose felt her resentment come to a peak.
Rose started to think that maybe she really, really hated Lily. She felt Lily deserved some major comeuppance. Some minor pranks wouldn't hurt, right? What if Lily's hairbrush had razors in it, so that when she brushed it, thick locks came out? What if some puking pastilles made it into her porridge while she ate breakfast with Scorpius? What if she mysteriously fell down some stairs and embarrassed herself in front of all the Slytherin boys, including Scorpius? What if Scorpius saw how silly this new relationship was and came back to Rose?
None of this worked out. Lily didn't even own a hairbrush. She was too busy talking and laughing with Scorpius to even eat her porridge. And when she fell down the stairs, she didn't embarrass herself at all – all she did was seriously injure herself, gaining all the attention from Scorpius that Rose had been trying to steal away.
Maybe skipping class half the time was the real Rose, she convinced herself as two hours passed, class began, and she still hadn't gotten out of bed.
Maybe being unpopular, single, and heartbroken was the real Rose. She just didn't want to accept it quite yet.
Lily sat on Albus' bed after class, waiting for him to show up. Only Lenny (of all people) had come through the dorm during the day, and he only nodded awkwardly at her before avoiding eye contact completely.
Ibrahim came in first, unaccompanied and with bags under his eyes.
"Hey!" Lily said a little too loudly.
He jumped, almost losing the books he was balancing in his arms. He smiled when he spotted her and responded, "Hey, Lily! Feeling better?"
"I'm feeling a lot better, thanks," she chirped, faking a bright smile to match his. She did not need pity right now. Or negativity. "Have you seen Albus today?" The question was useless, because she knew the answer would be yes.
"Yes," he replied. "He stopped to talk to Scorpius, actually. I bet you could catch them both right now, just down the stairs. Double-whammy." He smiled brightly, unaware that she would rather not join that (probably) tense conversation happening at the bottom of the stairs.
"Oh. I'll just wait for him to come up, then," Lily muttered. She leaned back against Albus' pillows, trying to look casual.
Albus eventually entered the room, however, Scorpius was right behind him, looking harried and out-of-breath. The pair stopped in their tracks when they spotted Lily waiting, and Lily froze when she spotted them stopping in their tracks.
"Oh, hey, sis. How are you?" Albus asked, almost looking suspicious as he slid his eyes from Scorpius to Lily.
"I'm fine. I just wanted to say hi," she answered, her eyes frozen on Scorpius, who had now recovered his breath, but still looked rather harried. "What are you two up to?"
"Albus wanted to have a 'discussion,'" Scorpius said, actually using air-quotes around the word discussion.
"I thought it would be beneficial to our friendship. I think…" Albus narrowed his eyes on Lily as he seemed to be forming a plan in his mind, "it would also be beneficial if you sat in on that discussion."
"I'll go," Ibrahim declared, looking all too aware of what this discussion actually entailed. And so he left quickly, giving Albus a pat on the shoulder as a goodbye.
"Sounds super beneficial," Lily quipped.
"Lily doesn't have to be here," Scorpius said, his eyes shooting daggers at Albus. The pink tinging his ears and cheeks indicated to Lily that he was… embarrassed? Whatever this discussion was, it couldn't be anything other than painful for Scorpius, considering the last interaction she had witnessed between them was Albus realizing his best friend had been sleeping with his little sister.
Lily was no expert on male relationships, but she was hyperaware that this was a no-no. She found this out when she heard the love story of her parents for the first time, and the fear that her father had for his and Uncle Ron's friendship. However, that relationship had worked out quite well. So far, Scorpius and Lily's was off to a rocky start. And a quite rocky middle.
"She definitely doesn't have to, but it seems like the fates wanted her to be here, and here she is," Albus said mystically.
"Okay, Trelawney," Lily groaned. Scorpius let out a sharp laugh, glanced at Lily's surprised expression, and then went back to his stony demeanor he had assumed since entering the room. But Lily couldn't help but smile at this small instance of Scorpius not being suspicious of her, or annoyed with her, or upset with her. Really, she would accept any positive emoting on his end.
"Sit here," Albus ordered, pointing to the bed adjacent to his own. Scorpius followed his order, and Albus pulled his trunk between the two beds to create a triangle seating arrangement between the three of them. Albus sat and sighed, his back ramrod straight and his eyes meeting first Lily's, then his friend's.
"Scorpius, I want to start out by saying that you've always been my best friend, besides… you know. But he doesn't really count because… you know," Albus rambled, then cleared his throat. "What I'm trying to say is… you're my close friend. I've always trusted you with my secrets, and you've always trusted me with yours. Whenever I needed someone to talk to, you were always there for me. I guess I never thought this," Albus gestured between the couple, "would happen."
"I didn't expect it to happen either—," Scorpius started, but was interrupted by Albus' raised hand.
"I know. I trusted you to take care of Lily, because Lily is literally the best person I know."
Lily rolled her eyes up to the ceiling as she felt tears coming. She clasped her shaking hands together between her thighs. This sucks, she thought. She had already felt horrible for so many things when it came to loving Scorpius, but she'd never even thought that deeply about Albus' close friendship with him. Was she really that selfish?
Albus continued, "So I guess I was more than a little surprised when I found out Lily wasn't being taken care of in the way I thought she was going to be taken care of by her first ever boyfriend."
Scorpius looked rotten with guilt, and wouldn't meet Lily's eyes. She knew what he was thinking: Shit, I've really fucked it up now. Or something along those lines.
"I'm so sorry, Albus. I didn't even think of it that way," Scorpius admitted.
"Um, wait," Lily interrupted, her eyebrows drawing together. "Did I miss the memo where I'm some sort of princess? Scorpius has never treated me in a way that I didn't want him to treat me. And last time I checked, Albus, you lost your virginity when you were fifteen."
Scorpius turned red and shot her a look like, you aren't helping!
"But Lily, you deserve to be with someone who is going to respect that sort of—," Albus began, but Lily cut him off.
"Scorpius has always respected me. In fact, sometimes I think he might be the only person who truly respects me." Lily looked Scorpius directly in his eyes as she said this, and he finally met her eyes for more than half a second. He seemed transfixed on her for a moment before he shook his head and looked down.
"Lily, you don't get it, because you're not a guy. You'll never truly understand what goes on in guys' heads. Scorpius, as great of a guy that he is, is still just guy," Albus continued.
Now Scorpius cut in, looking just as skeptical as Lily had moments before. "Okay, no. I really care about Lily. I would never be with her just to get in her pants. I really like her."
"Still?" Lily couldn't help but ask. Her desperate eyes searched his face, and suddenly Albus' presence really didn't matter anymore.
"Of course. That kind of stuff doesn't just go away," Scorpius confessed, although he sounded reluctant to say it.
"I never meant to lie to you. I just wanted you to see me as a good person," Lily said, her voice dropping. Looking at Scorpius and realizing she could lose him, she felt that nothing else really mattered to her. If she told him the truth and he didn't want her anymore, then was he even right for her?
Scorpius cracked a wry smile. "I've always thought you were a good person, even when you're kind of a flawed person. I guess I just don't get why you would lie about something like that. Is it because you think I'll think you're a… slut? Or something? Because I don't, and I would have no right to think that, given that I was with someone else before you, too."
Lily looked away, her eyes becoming moist with tears. It could go one of two ways – be seen as the homewrecker, or be seen as the victim. She didn't like either option.
"I want to be honest with you," Lily started. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes. The silence afterward stretched on so long that the three of them began to believe that Lily might not say anything at all. "Fine! I'll say it. I've been with another person, yes. I've been with multiple other people."
"The number doesn't matter," Scorpius quickly said. "I mean, I'd rather not know the number, if that's alright." Lily let out a little laugh, and Scorpius chuckled, too. Relief filled the space between them.
"Well, that's good news to hear!" Albus said sarcastically. "I don't know why that was such a big secret in the first place, but…"
"Wait," Scorpius stopped Albus mid-sentence. "That wasn't the big secret, was it?"
Damn. No, it wasn't the big secret. If Scorpius knew she had been lying earlier, of course he would spot the omission now. She really had intended on disclosing everything, but once Albus conveniently interrupted, she had felt free again.
She recalled the last time she had seen Philip, telling her Scorpius would never really love her and slamming the door on her. Just thinking about the fact that she had given into him made her skin crawl. She didn't feel the need to rehash it, ever.
"I-I-," Lily stuttered. She sighed and dropped her head into her hands. She considered fainting. Or maybe having an actual panic attack. She could probably have an actual panic attack right then.
"Whatever it is, Lily," Scorpius said, reaching out and laying a hand over her knee, "I won't judge you for it."
"We've all done things we aren't proud of," Albus said. "In fact, one time—"
"Actually, can you leave?" Scorpius interrupted. Albus jumped, turning to him in surprise.
"Excuse me? Lily is my sister! I have a right to be here for her. Right, Lily?"
"Actually, it would be awesome if you left," Lily agreed.
The room was silent as Albus huffed and shook his head at them. "Fine! Just take over my carefully planned discussion. It wasn't even beneficial anyways." He got up and stormed out, but neither Lily nor Scorpius seemed to care.
Scorpius switched from the adjacent bed to Albus'. The space between them shrunk as they slid closer together. He put his arm around her, and suddenly, she felt brave. She looked up at him and smiled, happy again for what felt like an eternity.
Lily wanted to tell him she loved him, but now wasn't the time. She needed his reaction from this, and then she would know for sure.
"So," Lily started. "Do you remember Philip? He was head boy, and you told me Rose made a pass at him?"
Scorpius' eyebrows scrunched, and he didn't reply, but she recognized comprehension in his eyes. He seemed as if he was waiting for the story to turn elsewhere, for a new name to crop up, but no, Philip's name was the one.
"He was the first person I ever had sex with," Lily breathed. She still felt tense, waiting for him to respond.
"Oh, my god," Scorpius finally said. "But he's much older, right? How did you two even meet?"
"We didn't meet recently. We met at Hogwarts," she said slowly. She didn't want it to dawn on him, but it was only a matter of seconds before it did.
"Oh. Wait. So he visited?" Scorpius sounded desperate, trying to grasp for some sense of reason in a situation that really didn't make sense.
"No, we both attended Hogwarts at the time," she admitted. "The beginning of my third year, and he was in his—"
"You were twelve?" he interrupted, his voice hoarse.
"No, I was thirteen," she snapped, not meaning to sound defensive but sounding guilty. She was guilty. His arm dropped from her shoulder and he turned his head slightly away from her. His expression looked similar to when he was trying to solve a hard arithmetic.
"And he was seventeen?"
"Eighteen," she replied softly. She'd made a mistake. She should have lied again. Would he have believed her if she'd lied again, but cried? She should have fake-cried and lied about losing her virginity to someone's boyfriend, someone recent and someone her own age.
"That's… awful," he whispered. He finally turned back to her, looking concerned. "You don't have to tell me anything else if you don't want to, but… was he violent? It's not too late to report him."
Lily blinked up at him, confused for a moment. "Wait. No, I think you're getting the wrong idea. We had… relations. For months! I mean. He didn't – it wasn't like he—," she shook her head and waved her hands frantically as she tried to get that damned concerned expression off his face. "No, you see, it was like this: we – Philip and I—"
"You don't seriously believe that this was a consensual relationship, do you?" Scorpius laughed, the noise sounding harsh. Her eyes widened in surprise at him, and he quickly backtracked. "Sorry, I don't mean to sound condescending, but he was way too old for you. And obviously manipulating you, because he was in a relationship with Ava that whole time. I remember because I had a huge crush on Rose, and Rose had a huge crush on Philip, who was conveniently unavailable." Scorpius swallowed and then shook his head and then sighed. He looked around, as if asking an imaginary audience for help.
"Philip doesn't see me like that. I've always been mature for my age," Lily said in defense.
"Oh, does Philip still see you, then?" Scorpius asked, sounding amused. Why was he so fucking amused?
"No! No, but, okay, I did see him kind of recently," Lily acquiesced. "But it didn't matter, and it only made me realize how much I wanted to be with you."
Scorpius froze, looking as if he'd been slapped. "You cheated on me?" he asked, his voice breaking.
"No! Oh Merlin, no! I would never cheat on you. I loved you before you even saw me as anything other than a friend. Why would I throw that away for someone who's getting married?"
"Oh, so you two didn't have sex?"
"No, we didn't!" Lily exclaimed. Scorpius spotted the lie and shot up from his seat. Lily grabbed at his arm desperately. "Wait – okay, we did, but we weren't technically together! It was after the Halloween party, when you and Rose were all happy and dancing together. It drove me mad and I got super jealous. I felt so alone, I – wait, please, don't go—!"
Lily was crying, she couldn't stop the shrill in her voice, and she watched as the guy she loved shook her off and walked away. She wouldn't let him go. She couldn't.
"Please!" she shrieked, shooting up from her seat and blocking his way.
"Halloween, we weren't together? Really? You know what I remember when I remember Halloween? I remember you dancing with me to Pink Rabbits, and I remember thinking about you and only you the rest of the night. And you were off with Philip? You sought him out?" Scorpius had built up to yelling by the end of his outburst. More tears flooded her eyes and he looked slightly apologetic for it, but ultimately, still upset.
Lily wanted to tell him about how she had seen him dancing with Rose, and how good they had looked together, but now it seemed stupid and petty to say. The words got caught in her throat. What evidence did she really have that he didn't want to be with her that night? His breakup had been fresh and he wanted to be sensitive to Rose's feelings, she knew that.
She was lost. She had blown it. She was in the wrong.
Scorpius laid his hands on her shoulders and pulled her close, and she wanted nothing more than to collapse into his arms and cry her apologies out, but that wasn't his intention. He held her a foot away so he could look her in the eyes as he spoke.
"What Philip did to you in third year? Not okay. Not okay, at all. And I don't blame you for it, and I don't judge you for it. I also don't pity you for it, because I know you, and I know you wouldn't want to ever be pitied. But Lily… please don't ever think that what you two did together in any way resembles a romantic relationship, because it doesn't."
"We loved each other," Lily said. It sounded pathetic, even to her own ears. Her tears had stopped, but her voice still sounded like gravel.
"I can't recall what you were like then, but no thirteen year old, no matter how mature they seem, is ready to have sex with an eighteen year old. It just… isn't right."
"I don't want to talk about the past anymore," Lily pleaded, knowing there was no point in trying to validate what she and Philip had once upon a time to Scorpius. "I just want to be with you."
Lily leaned forward and up on her tiptoes to kiss him, but he pulled away, dropping his hands from her shoulders. A moment of silence passed between them where Scorpius stared at the wooden floor between their feet, and where Lily looked up at him in sad confusion.
"What's wrong?" Lily said, the tears beginning to build back up again.
"Maybe Albus is right," Scorpius said quietly.
"Albus? Wait, didn't we both just agree that he's an idiot?"
"No, I mean… I'm seventeen and you're fifteen. I shouldn't be treating you like you're…"
"Like I'm what?" Lily prompted, taking his hand and stepping closer so he was forced to look at her.
"Like you're all grown up. Like you're ready to have a sexual relationship with someone," Scorpius said.
"Are you kidding me? We've had sex how many times, and now you're saying you shouldn't have?" Lily's voice reached a hysterical volume and she gladly stepped back from Scorpius.
"What do I have to do, Scorpius? What do I have to do to deserve you? I'm never going to be your age. I'm always going to be younger than you. And I'm never going to be sweet little studious Rose, I'm always going to be me! All I've ever done is love you and support you, even when you were hung up on Rose, even when you tried to push me away. I just told you a secret I've never told anyone, just because I wanted to prove to you that I could be honest with you! That I would be selfless, for you!"
Lily let out a sob. "Well?" she asked, frustrated. "This is your last chance. I thought you loved me. Was it a lie or not?"
Scorpius glared at her, but he seemed to almost be glaring past her. His eyes shone, like he might cry, too. "It wasn't a lie, okay? I love you!" Scorpius shouted. "I want to be with you so bad."
"Then stop letting shit get in the way and just be with me," she said sharply, turning to go.
Scorpius' hand grabbed her shoulder and spun her around, and suddenly his arms wrapped around her and he was burying his nose in her hair.
Lily froze, surprised. Slowly, she wrapped her arms around him, too.
"Is this a goodbye hug?" she said softly, her throat sore and aching. She felt her heart breaking, because it seemed like he was saying goodbye.
He said something muffled into her hair, and she pulled away. "What?"
"I said, no. This isn't a goodbye hug. This is a 'no shit in the way' hug. I don't know why, but for some reason I keep sabotaging this relationship, accidentally or not."
"No," she said softly, "I also keep doing that. It's not all your fault."
"I think there are other forces at play, too," he admitted. Neither of them said her name, but they both knew who. "I'm sorry for blowing up. There was really no reason to. I guess I was just jealous… not about the first bit, but about the Halloween bit."
"That was so stupid of me. You have no idea how stupid I can be," Lily said, wanting to cry out of relief.
"I don't think you're stupid, Lily. Let's just go to bed and we can talk in the morning, figure everything out. Does that sound okay?" Scorpius asked.
The tone had shifted so drastically that Lily's blood was still slowing it's pumping by the time she replied, "That sounds perfect."
Albus jumped when the door to the seventh year Slytherin dormitory opened. Ibrahim now stood beside him, looking concerned when the couple exited.
"I heard yelling. Is everything okay?" Albus asked.
"Everything is fine," Lily said. Scorpius smiled down at her.
"I'll see you later," Scorpius whispered into her ear.
"Tomorrow," she agreed.
He brushed his fingers over hers and then ascended up the steps to his dorm.
"So what was the big secret?" Albus asked once Scorpius' door shut.
"Oh, fuck off," Lily snapped, still smiling, and skipped down the stairs to head back to Gryffindor tower.
Wow, definitely meant to update this in February. So sorry for the very, very late update. In other news, happy belated first birthday to Innocence!
Hope you enjoyed and please drop a review or a favorite! Maybe give me a book recommendation or something. I'm always looking for new books to read.
I still love every one of you beautiful, beautiful readers.
-Ash