The next morning, I was hated by pretty much everyone that once had liked me. When I came to the Gryffindor table, Felicia pointedly looked the other way, James gave me a creepily accurate imitation of my very own Death Glare, and even Al seemed irritated with me.

I decided that I didn't want to be bothered by any of them and their bad moods and looked around at the food in front of me. Sausages and bacon. The toast was sitting in front of James. I mustered up the courage to ask him for it.

"James –"

"I'm sorry, I don't talk to traitors," James said loudly.

Sighing, I realized that this would have to be a morning without breakfast. Sour cousins and silent best friends wouldn't keep me from my oath as a vegetarian. I looked around the Great Hall, wondering where I might find a friendly face. There was none. I caught Scorpius' eye over at the Slytherin table. I wanted to give him a sort of shy smile, but he only looked away quickly again. Great, I thought.

Reaching some sort of resolution, I piled several sausages and strips of bacon onto my plate, and poured ketchup over the whole lot. I took a bite of a sausage.

Heaven.

I really had been missing out on something! As if I didn't know. I had to be the worst vegetarian ever – bringing shame to other vegetarians, and death to innocent animals. The worst part was that I had trouble really caring. Everyone seemed to hate me. Somehow, I had an easier time dealing with the hate of James and Felicia – I was used to James being a hysterical prick and Felicia – well, we were best friends, and she had to come around, right? But as for Scorpius… I really couldn't see any way out of that one. He hated me. And I could even understand why.

The morning post arrived, with a school owl bringing identical notes to me and Felicia – I only knew this because the owl delivered a note to each of us. Mine said:

You will be serving your detention tonight at nine. You are to come to the Entrance Hall. Bring your cloak and wand.

Professor M. McGonagall

At this point I realized that my life couldn't get any worse. I must have been the only prefect in the history of Hogwarts to serve two detentions within two weeks. I was also bringing shame over the school, now. I wondered if I should just quit everything and go home.

As the clock was about five to nine, and everyone got up to go to class, I was only halfway through my meat heavy breakfast. "Rose, are you coming?" Al asked.

"No," I said simply. "I am going to sit here and finish my breakfast."

"You'll be late for Transfiguration," he told me.

"I don't care," I said, and to my own disbelief, I didn't.

The entire Great Hall cleared out, and I continued to sit and eat. Scorpius looked at me curiously as he left the Great Hall at five past nine (late to class, as usual). He lingered a bit, but then turned around and left, leaving me all alone.

I swallowed my mouth full of bacon and then I burst into tears.

That night at five minutes to nine, I stood in the Entrance Hall, shifting my feet nervously. I wasn't expecting this to be pleasant at all. How could it be, when I would be serving detention with my apparently un – best friend? Felicia hadn't even showed up yet. I wondered if maybe she wasn't coming. Maybe she had requested to have her detention another day, just to avoid me. I was wrong, though, because just as the thought had popped into my head, Felicia came down the staircase and stood silently as far away from me as possible. She didn't say hello.

I was just wondering how I would deal with this night, when I heard to voices emerging from the stairs leading up from the dungeons.

I looked around. Oh, Merlin. Scorpius and Demetria were entering the Hall, and were walking straight towards me. Scorpius looked surprised at seeing me.

"Oh," said Demetria. "Are you serving detention tonight, too?"

"Yes," I said.

"Why are you here?" Felicia asked Scorpius.

"I have detention, too," Scorpius said.

I had forgotten. In the midst of my own immensely growing misery, I had, of course, forgotten that Scorpius had gotten detention for getting drunk in Hogsmeade and calling himself Batman. I felt weird when I remembered that that had happened only two nights ago.

Once the clock struck nine, Slughorn entered the hall, also coming from the staircase to the dungeons.

"Lovely to see that you are all here," he said brightly, beaming at us all, as though having detention was a special treat. I was beginning to think that this detention would be some kind of perverse torture, given to me by fate for being… me.

"As it is, my Seventh Years will be making a potion soon, called the Draught of Blooddrinkers – very interesting potion, still quite experimental, it is supposed to turn a vampire into a vegan – should be quite fun to do – but, yes, it happens that one of the key ingredients in this potion is Vampire Berries, a sort of red berry that grows wild in the forest. It tastes like blood and is therefore often eaten by vampires when there is a lack of living beings for them to attack – and happens to grow in the Forbidden Forest!" Slughorn finished this and beamed at us all.

"You're joking," Demetria said in a shrill voice. "You want us to go into the Forbidden Forest? We could – we could die."

"Nonsense!" said Slughorn happily. "If you find yourself in any danger, send up red sparks, I'll be watching from the lawn – I'm going to start a bonfire, should be quite cozy –"

"What if there are werewolves?" Demetria asked, looking a little hysterical. "Or vampires?"

I thought that Demetria, of all people, should not be nervous in the least about vampires. If she met one, she could simply bare her own fangs at it, and it would run screaming the other way. I supposed that Demetria perhaps did not know how frightening her pointed teeth really were. This actually made me feel slightly sorry for her. After all, if Demetria herself didn't know how frightening her teeth were, and no one had ever been kind enough to tell her, well then she obviously never had the chance to get her teeth changed. I always thought that Demetria prided herself on her fangs – sorry, teeth – but now I thought differently. I realized that I had been daydreaming a little and hadn't heard Slughorn's long lecture on why the forest ought to be safe enough.

The four of us walked slowly and reluctantly towards the edge of the forest. The path was only wide enough for two to walk on, and as neither Scorpius nor Felicia seemed interested in walking next to me, Demetria took on that burden.

After walking in silence for a while, I attempted to make small talk, in order to distract myself from the obvious way in which Scorpius was repulsed by me. It made me hate myself and hate him at the same time – couldn't he see that it wasn't my fault? Couldn't he see that no matter how one looked at it, I couldn't be with him in that way, when my whole family – or at least James, who sometimes seemed to have the ego of the entire family – was so against it? Most of all, I realized, I hated James, for making this so difficult. I decided that Felicia could have James all to herself, and the two of them could run off and have disgusting children with bulging eyes and huge tempers. I fantasized about poking James' eyes out with his own broomstick. Then I decided that that was a disgusting and creepy thought to have, and was a clear sign of my being deranged and sick, and no wonder no one wanted to talk to me, and said to Demetria:

"Full moon tonight."

"Oh, don't say that," she squealed in a very pathetic voice that didn't really suit her at all. "That just means that there might be werewolves."

"We found some!" Scorpius called back to us. I hadn't realized how far we were into the forest until just then. All around me I could only see trees – when I looked behind me the path winded so much that I couldn't see the lawn beyond the forest anymore. I couldn't help but shudder, which made me feel just as squirmy and pathetic as Demetria.

"Great," Demetria replied. We caught up with Scorpius and Felicia, both of whom pretended that I was some sort of gnarled, insignificant tree root, far beneath their superior notice. I decided to pretend that I was a tree root, by keeping quiet and out of the way. Felicia and Demetria stuffed their pockets with the berries, and upon deciding that that was enough, we all turned back and rambled off towards the castle. I kept staring at the back of Scorpius' head, wondering what was going on in there. I hoped just a little that he was thinking about me. Maybe he was regretting the fact that he had ignored me all day so far. But then again, maybe he was thinking that I deserved it.

In this depressing, very gloomy way, I was walking along, looking at my feet and being swallowed up by my own huge amounts of misery. That's why I was was all surprised when Felicia screamed in front of us. I whipped my head up, hitting Demetria in the face with my ponytail.

"Keep the carrot under control," Demetria grumbled, but I barely heard her. I was looking at the thing that had made Felicia scream. Scorpius stood in front of me, looking frozen.

It was a werewolf.

I had never seen a werewolf before (unless you count Uncle Bill, but he doesn't really count, seeing as he's only like a half – werewolf. He's more like a werepuppy) so my jaw dropped, like I was going to scream, but no sound came out.

The werewolf looked just about as shocked to see us as we were to see it. At first the four of us stared at it. It's eyes were wide and yellow, it's fur was brown, tufts of it sticking out. There were leaves caught in its tail. And then – it bared its fangs. They were long, tinted with yellow at the tip.

A horrible growl ripped from its throat, sending chills down my spine. Then, we all screamed simultaneously. I turned around and ran back the way that we had come from. I didn't realize where we were running, only that we weren't running fast enough, I could still here the werewolf growling and barking a little behind us.

"Go faster, weasel girl!" Demetria shrieked at me tugging my arm along with her.

"Vampire!" I shouted back automatically as a retort, not really thinking that that was the weirdest thing to yell at a person.

Scorpius had almost outstripped us all on his longer legs. There werewolf was falling farther and farther behind, its growls becoming a little fainter. I wondered if it had given up. Then I tripped over an actual tree root on the ground. At first I hadn't really realized what had happened – that I was lying on the ground while being chased by a werewolf who clearly was up for a snack. Then, I tried to scramble to my feet, but realized – too late, for the werewolf was catching up – that my robes were caught on a branch. I tugged on them, but nothing happened – I could now hear the werewolf's feet hitting the ground behind me.

Then someone yelled "Rose!" and someone skidded to a stop in front of me, held out a hand and yanked me to my feet, ripping my robes. It was Scorpius.

"What the hell are you doing, you klutz?" he almost shouted at me.

"Sunbathing, what do you think?" I yelled back, a ringing sound in my ears. The words were barely out of my mouth before he had shoved me onto the ground off the path. Scorpius then threw himself onto me, knocking the wind out of me. I was about to complain about this slightly uncomfortable predicament (and then again, I didn't really mind being that close to him) when Scorpius but a hand over my mouth to silence me.

It only took me a few seconds to find out why. The werewolf had given up chasing the others and was now sniffing the area dangerously close to our hiding place. Scorpius took out his wand and pointed it towards where the werewolf sounded like it was.

Suddenly, the werewolf stopped, and poked its head around a tree and spotted us. I could swear it almost smiled with those awful fangs before it leaped at us. Scorpius grabbed me and rolled, causing the werewolf to miss us by inches.

"Stupefy!" he shouted, casting a jet of red light towards the werewolf. The spell missed, but the red light distracted the werewolf long enough for the two of us to crawl behind another tree.

"I can't believe this is happening," I whispered. "I can't believe this is happening."

Scorpius grabbed my hand and held it tightly. It hurt, but I was glad he did it. It made me feel less scared. At that moment, however, the werewolf seemed to have found us again. Scorpius and I jumped to our feet and began to run, just in any random direction. I didn't even know where we were – it definitely wasn't the path, we were crashing through bushes, getting ripped on branches. There werewolf was frighteningly close to us. I pulled my wand out of my robes and pointed it over my shoulder without looking and shouted: "Impedimenta!"

The sounds of the approaching werewolf stopped. Scorpius and I slowed to a stop and looked over our shoulders. The werewolf was struggling, as though it had been stopped by some kind of barrier.

"Nice going," Scorpius said, sounding out of breath.

"Thanks," I said weakly in return. "We'd better get out of here, quick, before the spell wears off."

Scorpius grabbed my hand and we started racing forwards again. "Where are we going?" I asked him, while struggling for breath.

"Anyway that leads us out!"

We ran for what felt like hours to get as far away from the werewolf as possible. Finally, we could see light and, eventually, the Hogwarts Castle ahead. We stopped, panting and resting our hands on our knees. I collapsed to the ground, and held my head in my hands, trying to catch my breath. Scorpius, also sounding exhausted sat down next to me.

We sat in silence for a while, trying to breathe normally again. My heart was still pounding wildly. Scorpius turned to me. I liked how his cheeks were all pink from the exercise.

"Do you need anything?" he asked me. "Like, water or something?"

"Honestly," I said, "after that I think that I'll need mouth – to – mouth, but –"

Scorpius then covered my lips with his own. I jumped a little with shock, but that didn't stop him. I had hardly registered the kiss when he pulled away again.

He smirked at my shocked expression.

"You know," I said, trying to arrange my features into something more dignified. "I didn't mean it literally."

"You were practically begging for it," Scorpius said, rolling his eyes. "Mouth – to – mouth, honestly… Anyway, after such a huge wild adventure together, you would think that we were allowed a moment? Or is that forbidden for cousin James as well?"

"Shut up," I mumbled, looking down.

"No, I'm just asking," said Scorpius. "Can I talk to you and stuff?"

"I don't know, okay?" I said, a little louder than I intended. "I don't know what's going on."

Scorpius didn't say anything to that, and I almost felt bad for scolding him.

"Thanks for saving my life," I told him finally. "I owe you."

"I didn't save your life," Scorpius scoffed, in a tone that clearly said that he was still irritated with me. "You were the one who cast the spell that stopped it."

"So?" I asked. "You came back for me. And I thought you hated me. So thanks."

"I don't hate you," Scorpius said. "I lo-"

"There they are!" I heard Demetria shout, and looking up I saw her and Felicia run towards us, with the fat little figure of Slughorn following them.

Wanting to make the moment last a little longer I said, "You what, Scorpius, what were you going to say?"

"Nothing," Scorpius said, shaking his head and getting to his feet.

"No, really," I pressed, feeling desperate and pathetic.

"Oh Merlin!" Felicia shrieked and threw her arms around me as they reached us. "Merlin, Rose, I really, really thought that you were dead!"

I was surprised to see tears in her eyes. "I'm not," I told her.

"And then I thought that what if you died and we were in a stupid fight?" Felicia continued, sounding like she was about to cry.

"It's okay," I told her, trying to sound soothing. "It's okay."

Once Felicia and I were done embracing, Scorpius and Demetria were only two shadows on their way up to the castle again.

A little later in my bed, my mind was racing over the evening. Scorpius had come back for me. Scorpius didn't hate me. In fact he – I didn't know. What had he been about to say? Could it have been "love"? Was he about to tell me that he loved me?

Feeling less miserable than that morning, but a whole lot more confused, I closed my eyes and pulled the covers over my head.