—CHAPTER ELEVEN—
"I really think you ought to be staying the entire holidays with us," Rose said, pouting a little.
It was bitter cold as the train pulled up at Hogsmeade's station with a puff of steam announcing its arrival. Students blew warm breath into cold hands and pulled their luggage towards fogged up carriages. Winter was upon them with a vengeance as the Christmas holidays began.
Scorpius stood on the platform, his hair tucked into a beanie and his hands lost in an oversized jumper. Zabini stood beside him, hands in pockets, jumping on the spot to stay warm.
"We're not staying the whole holidays," Scorpius replied, rolling his eyes. "We'll be there Christmas morning."
"Bring a change of clothes," Rose added. "For Boxing Day."
"We know," Zabini sighed, his breath congealing into a cloud. "Can you get your arse on that train so we can farewell you and get back up to the warmth of the castle?"
The train blew its whistle. Rose took a few steps back, her trunk trailing behind her. Albus poked his head out of the window to wave her down. It was time for her to go.
"Five days," Scorpius reminded her, "and then we'll be seeing you again."
"Alright. Five days. Send me an owl if anything goes wrong."
"Nothing will," they chorused, waving her off. Rose sprinted for Albus' carriage, yanked the trunk up the stairs, and the train began its slow move out of the station. Scorpius didn't move until the train was out of sight.
Five days.
"What's going on between you and Weasley?" Zabini frowned.
"Nothing. We're friends," Scorpius said just as candidly, twisting his scarf around his neck. He turned and headed away from the empty platform, nothing but the cloud of evaporating steam to remind them that the train had been there at all. The two goblin guards there glanced at them, but said nothing. They continued up the walkway, the wind tugging against their hair.
"Let's grab a coffee from the village," Zabini suggested, shivering slightly. "I'm not walking all the way back up to the school without something hot in my hands."
Scorpius nodded tiredly. They were not the only students that had come to wish their friends goodbye. Naomi Bones had decided to stay behind, and she had come down to see her boyfriend Dolt Wolton off. A few seventh years had come down under the pretence of wishing their friends off so they could drop into the village for last minute Christmas shopping. Most of the teachers were on the platform too.
As they wound their way off the platform and towards the village, Scorpius noticed something different. At first, he thought it was the lack of festive decorations. Usually, Hogsmeade looked like a snow globe. There was no brilliant lights or tinsel or icicles. In fact, the street looked stripped back and mundane.
But this was not what had forced him to stop. The entire village was covered in posters—Undesirable Posters. They showed Harry Potter and Victoire Weasley, face after face, sheet after sheet, but the wording on the posters had changed. The labels above their heads now read: DESIRABLE NO.1 and DESIRABLE NO.2. It had not been immediately obvious, but the moment Scorpius noticed it, he couldn't unnotice it.
"Merlin," he said quietly, staring at the posers. Goblins in their Ministry armour were moseying by or standing in shop fronts. There was no calamity, and no one tearing them down. Had they noticed? Or did the Elite Squad simply not care? "Let's get out of here," Scorpius decided, plucking at Zabini's robes. "We'll get you a coffee from the kitchens in Hogwarts."
Rose and Albus cringed into their seats. Ron, who was in the driver's seat, had not said a word for half an hour. They were out of London now, and without the sound of traffic, the silence was deafening. The back of the car had a tricky Undetectable Extension Charm that made it feel like a limousine. The three Potters kids were there as well, all unceremoniously quiet.
"Some warning would've been nice," Ron fumed.
"Well, you would've said no if I warned you," Rose replied.
"Because—well—would you blame me? Don't any of you see how thick you're being? How can we have a Malfoy and a Zabini hanging around on Christmas with all the Order business going on?" Ron bellowed.
"It's Christmas, Dad, we shouldn't even have to talk about the Order business," Hugo complained.
"Well—what about the wedding? Teddy and Victoire are getting married and we can't bloody have a bunch of Slytherin teenagers coming along when Victoire is supposed to be in hiding."
"Malfoy is trustworthy!" To Rose's surprise, this came from James Potter. "Zabini isn't, but Malfoy is."
"Zabini is trustworthy," Rose snapped. James snorted to express his derision. "And in any case," Rose added, her voice strained. "They're only staying for Christmas. Then they're going back to Hogwarts."
"Since when are Vic and Teddy getting married?" Albus exclaimed leaning against his seatbelt.
"Merlin, Dad! Do you really think I would befriend people who would sell us out?" Rose cried. "They're on our side, alright? Just trust them!"
"But seriously," Albus interrupted, his voice still indignant. "Since when are Vic and Teddy getting married? Didn't they just get back together?"
"Had they ever really broken up, though?" Lily countered.
They drove the rest of the way to Devon in relative silence, with exception to Albus, who continually muttered, "Why am I always the person who is last to find out everything?"
The three-hour drive was tense, the country bouncing by the windows and the car doors squeaking. They broke the news to their father after they had packed their trunks in the car at King Cross, and he had been fuming since. No one really felt like talking. Hugo dosed on Lily's shoulder. Albus and James played a silent game of Spotto which involved shoving each other a lot. It was dark by the time hey neared the village, and as Ron seemed to have yelled himself hoarse for now, they all took this as a good sign.
The castle was near empty, the common room almost totally vacant. There were a couple of seventh years staying behind, but they exclusively lived in the library, desperately catching up on study and were rarely seen. Malfoy and Zabini were the only sixth year boys, and Alice Lim was the only sixth year girl so they found themselves sharing dinner together. Other than their immediate crew, Meredith Maxwell and her best friend Betty Fink had also chosen to stay behind together.
Over the first five days of holidays, the five of them occupied the sofas and armchairs closest to the fire and stayed up as late as they wanted. It was the closest thing to anarchy that the Slytherin hierarchy had ever allowed. It was giving the second year girls awfully big heads.
For instance, they would ask nosey questions like, "Where were you all day today, Scorpius?" or "Why were you down near Hagrid's hut this afternoon, Scorpius," to which he would give variations of "it is none of your business." Scorpius was, in fact, splitting himself between his Potions projects and Rose's Christmas present, but that really was none of their business.
They would assault the others with similar questions, too. "How come you chose to stay at Hogwarts, Alice?" and "How come you always copy off other people's homework, Andy?" The replies were generally less polite from those two—Sod off or Call me Andy again and I'll hex you seven ways to Sunday. But the girls only giggled and preened themselves and pretended to be far more mature than they really were.
But the girls grew on them. Alice braided Betty Fink's frizzy, red hair one night when they were all in the common room. When Scorpius was intrigued, she showed him how to do it and he spent half the evening practicing on Meredith's hair, doing French braids and fishbone braids and every other braid in between until he had mastered the method.
They played Christmas-themed question games, Zabini's favourite being, "If you had all the gold in the world, what would you get me for Christmas?"
They took turns answering the hypotheticals and seeing how well they could suit each other's tastes. For Alice, Scorpius would get her a personalised, one-on-one concert by the Ministry of Madness. Alice would get Meredith a sock to shove in her mouth to stop her incessant chattering—"an expensive sock, though!"—and Meredith would buy Betty Fink a unicorn, which received a chorus of groans from the sixth years. The rest unanimously agreed that they would give Zabini money outright, which he appreciated.
"Or," Malfoy said, crossing his legs to make himself more compact on the sofa. Zabini was sprawled across it and was taking up a lot of the room. "I would buy you a pub. And a house to live in on top of it."
"That's really nice. Cheers, Malfoy," Zabini grinned
Those first five days were a truly enjoyable Christmas holiday. There wasn't a benefit ball to dress up for, nor an opera to see, or a family dinner to sit through. Scorpius was left to his own devices. There was no pressure to perform. He could come and go as he pleased, and it was freedom.
He knew he would be meeting Rose's entire family in a mater of forty-eight hours, and he knew the feeling wouldn't last.
A few days before Christmas Eve, the Ministry of Magic was swathed in posters. Image upon image of indigenous propaganda, stuck to the walls and between people's office cubicles.
The Undesirable No. 1 posters had not had their slogan changed this time. Rather, their picture had been transfigured to show the Minister of Magic himself—his large elephant ears, wrinkled brow and grey suit. It was not a flattering photo either. The Minister looked aged, slightly manic, and the slogan above his head did match the visual descriptor of Undesirable. The words beneath Gladstone read: Paranoid and Despotic. Approach with Caution. Wanted from Crimes Against Magical Humanity. A group of maintenance wizards were trying to unstick them.
The plethora of posters stating that Harry Potter should be the Minister for Magic provided the utter contrast: Potter, with his familiar bespectacled face and lightening bolt scar, looked completely reasonable beside the Undesirable Posters of the Minister.
Hermione saw this on her way to work and felt her stomach tie itself into knots. She walked as quickly as she could through the Atrium, head ducked down and bushy hair flying. The Ministry uncharacteristically had very little Christmas decorations about. Ten minutes after arriving at her office, she was called down to the Basement, Level One, to meet with the Minister. She squared her shoulders and prepared for the worst.
She received worse than the worst. Creswell was there, glazed eyes and absent. Grigarex stood, agitated, by the door. The Minister of Magic had destroyed half of his office—he had upturned a side table, scattering parchment everywhere—he had blown up an expensive looking vase—he was in the process of tearing one Wanted poster to shreds when Hermione clicked the door shut behind her.
"Er, Merry Christmas, Minister," Hermione said. After all this time, it still felt difficult to keep the shaking from her voice.
A radio was perched in the corner of the room, much like the one installed in her kitchen, but it was turned low. Still, she was sure that the familiar rhythm of the news broadcasts was not coming from it, nor any catchy jingles. It sounded like voices…conversations. Too low to be heard. Rising and modulating casually, with the clinking sound of cutlery in the background.
Gladstone blustered for a few moments before he managed to get the words out. "Grr-Granger! If you are truly loyal to the Ministry, then it is high time that you help us."
"With what, sir?" Hermione said, maintaining her cool tone.
Gladstone snorted with fury, inhaling one of the torn up pieces of the poster. He thrust the two halves at her. "This."
"Right," Hermione said, battering them away with her wand. "Well, it really just seems like a practical joke to me, Minister. I don't think there's any harm done with silly posters."
"Not any—not any harm—not any harm done?"
"This is a distraction to why I was called here," Grigarex said coolly, standing by the door now. "If you are pleased with my account, Minister, I will take my leave."
"I am not pleased—you stay right there Grigarex!"
Creswell twitched slightly at the shouting but otherwise appeared to be completely spaced out. Hermione chewed her lip nervously.
"I have a duty to attend to the King as his advisor. With the miners rioting—"
"We must find whoever is doing this and prosecute them," Gladstone fumed, speaking right over the top of Grigarex. He turned back to Hermione now. His hands gripped the desk, thick and engorged. "It is an act of terrorism."
"No, it isn't," Hermione said slowly, still holding her wand at hip height. "It is an act of protest."
"Aha!" Gladstone cried, snapping his fingers at her. "I knew it! You are behind this."
"Me?"
"You—all you lot! You and your husband and the rest of you."
Hermione was really beginning to boil now. Her voice trembled with rage as she spoke. "You have no evidence to suggest that any of us are involved—"
"I believe, according to my sources," Gladstone said, snatching up a handful of papers and filling through them rapidly, "that in your first year of Hogwarts, you and your housemates created a poster that said Potter for President. Expressing the very same sentiments as you are now, weren't you?"
Hermione blinked at him in disbelief. Even Grigarex seemed embarrassed by this display.
"We were eleven. We made that for a Quidditch game—it cannot be remotely linked to—"
"And!" Gladstone continued, flipping through several other papers. "You were the one to start grassroots rebellion groups like Society for the Promotion of Elfish Welfare and Dumbledore's Army."
"You mean, the groups that helped to overthrow Elf-Slavery and Lord Voldemort." Hermione let out a high pitch laugh, unable to contain herself any longer. "I'm not sure what you're getting at, Minister."
"We are setting up Ministry of Magic Witch Watchers to monitor anyone involved in sticking up these posters. If I find that you or your family are behind this—or that you've gotten some elves from that ridiculous EARWIG movement to go and post these pictures up—or whatever it is you've done, then I will arrest all of you and have you prosecuted."
"I'm not involved in this!" Hermione cried, throwing her arms out wide. "Although, frankly, I now wish I was!"
There was a tense silence in which Gladstone's grey face churned with fury. Hermione blinked back at him, clutching her wand in case he was to attack her. Even Creswell, in his Imperius Curse fog, turned to see what would happen.
"Out," Gladstone whispered, his voice shaking. "Don't ever step into this building again."
"I've been fired," Hermione said, throwing a box of her belongings onto the kitchen counter and taking a seat at the table. Her husband, who was stunned to find her home so early in the afternoon, only blinked for a few minutes before retrieving a wine glass from the topmost cabinet.
"I'll make dinner tonight," he decided.
Hermione raised her glass, and he poured enough wine that it licked the rim. "I should add," she nodded towards the humming radio, "Gladstone will be watching us."
"Hasn't he been already?"
"He thinks we're responsible for those posters."
"Blimey," Ron muttered pouring himself a glass too. "Who is responsible? I'd like to congratulate them."
"Let's just hope it's none of our clan," Hermione said. "If I found out this was the doing of Molly Weasley, I might actually have an aneurism."
Hugo entered the kitchen, picking up a wine glass from the bench and filling it as well. He turned to face his parents, leaning against the kitchen cabinets.
"What are we drinking to?" he asked.
Ron took the glass out of his son's hand and passed it to Hermione, who set aside her glass to drink the new one. She took several consecutive gulps before placing it on the table.
"Nothing worth celebrating, mate," Ron sighed.
Instead of his usual night-terrors, James found himself waking up sweaty and breathless from a dream he couldn't remember, and then finding it impossible to get back to sleep. This was happening so frequently that he would often crash around midday, sprawled across the sofa, too exhausted to pay attention to whatever was happening around the house.
In every other respect, he was flying high. Maybe it was the comfort of being back at home or the lack of homework related stress or even just the jolly, festive mood that Christmas brought—in any case, he was feeling at ease, even ecstatic at times. He spent the first week of holidays at the Scamanders' place, where he, Lorcan and occasionally Lysander would sit outside bird watching or muck around on their booms. In every way possible, Christmas had proved to be a distraction, and he was feeling like his old self again.
The holidays would be perfect if he could just get a good night's sleep.
Fed up with his tossing and turning, James crept from his bedroom, across the living room, and entered the kitchen. His toes curled on the cold tiles. He hopped across to the kitchen cabinets to retrieve some cereal, which he ate straight of the box, without milk, while sitting on the kitchen counter. The radio installed there—stuck to the counter's surface with a permanent sticking charm—was humming out a pre-recorded, monotonous tone.
"The witches and wizards responsible for the defacement of the Undesirable posters will face severe…the goblin liaison office reassures the public that the strikes are …Gladstone met with the Goblin King to discuss the need for land reform, redistributing land occupied by predominantly magical-bodied creatures…"
It went on and on, unceasing. James crunched and munched on his cereal, letting the words flow into his ear and out the other side. The light of their Christmas tree flashed and twinkled across the carpet of the living room, seen from where he sat on the kitchen counter top. It occurred to him how selfish and childish he had often been at Christmas time. His expectation of gifts and brilliant feasts. This time last year, he had blown all his savings paying off the interest on a dodgy shark loan, after getting nose-deep into debt. He thought of Claretta, being hunted by goblins after doing the exact same thing. They were greedy, stupid, thrill-seeking fools.
There were footsteps out in the corridor, creaking the familiar floorboards, and then a few moments later his mother was poking her head into the kitchen.
"Peckish, were we?" she asked, joining him in the kitchen.
"You betcha," he said, and then immediately found the irony in this.
His mother crossed to the counter, taking out a bowl and taking the cereal box from his hand so she could actually make herself a proper midnight snack. When she was done, she passed the box back to him. She set about this very casually, as if it were actually eight o'clock and they were preparing breakfast. He found it rather bizarre, not being questioned for his nocturnal habits. So bizarre that he was the one to ask, "Can't sleep?"
"Not a wink," she answered with a tired smile, drawing up a kitchen chair. "I heard you get up."
"Sorry."
"I was already awake," she excused, scooping up her cereal with a silver spoon. "I find it funny sleeping in an empty bed, even after all this time."
She stared at the icebox for a moment, as if intensely intrigued by it. "You know," she frowned, "Your dad used to work some very strange hours. But at some point in the night, he would come to bed. Whether it was three in the morning or six, right before I got up, he would fall into bed beside me and I would feel this sense of peace."
James watched her for a moment as she stared at the icebox absently. Her red hair was tied in a messy ponytail and she was in a pair of violet pyjamas. She looked dreadfully tired. It is always a startling moment to realise that you and your mother are both adults. Even if you are still her child, you are no longer a child.
"I can't sleep," James admitted, knowing that all along this is what his mother had followed him in here to hear. "I haven't slept properly in a while. Because of nightmares," he added, feeling ridiculously young. "But now I can't sleep at all."
Ginny nodded, stirring her cereal with her spoon. "I had the same sort of trouble after the Chamber of Secrets fiasco."
James raised his eyebrows to prompt her to go on. His mother sighed and placed the bowl on the table. The radio now hummed along in the background, practically ignored.
"I had some rather difficult nightmares after being possessed by Voldemort."
"Naturally," James said, matching her strange, casual tone.
"I found it hard to sleep for months. Especially that summer holidays."
James tugged at a loose string on his pyjama trousers. "How'd you deal with it?"
"I didn't," she shrugged. "I bottled it up and tried to keep myself busy. In my second year, I made friends with Luna and that helped a lot. I mean, we were both complete outcasts—she was this nutty dork and I was the girl who set a Basilisk on the school. But we got on. I stayed busy. It took me years before I could talk about what happened, though," she added. "Not until I was about fourteen. And I wouldn't say I was over it. But I had learned to cope with it."
Ginny stood, slurping the contents of her cereal and putting the bowl in the sink, to be washed in the morning. She headed towards the kitchen and switched off the gas lamp. She leaned against the doorjamb and smiled tiredly at her son, the light of the Christmas tree dancing across her hair.
"It helped though, having someone like Luna. Someone who wasn't involved. I couldn't talk to your grandma and grandpa, not really. And I couldn't talk to any of your uncles either. I dunno why. Maybe to convince them I was fine, or to shield them from the pain that my pain would cause. But Luna was outside of it all, so she was different. And talking to her helped."
"Right," James nodded. He also got up off the counter. "I'm glad you had her then."
"Of course, now I'm having an affair with her husband," Ginny said, her face totally straight.
"Luna would probably be okay with an open relationship," James replied, just as stoically.
His mother smirked, her eyes lingering on James' freckled face. No longer thin and skinny, but squared and hard. No longer a boy's face. She wished him goodnight and headed out of the kitchen. James sighed heavily, reached to turn off the radio before remembering there was no off nob and then returned his cereal box to the cabinet.
He crept out of the kitchen, past the blinking Christmas tree, and down the corridor. However, he hesitated outside of his room and looked at the ajar door at the very end of the hallway. He slid inside, feet light on the floorboards. He slid into bed with his mother, tugging the blankets up to his chin, and they both fell asleep, her arm thrown over his broad back.
The first stirring that something was changing occurred on a Monday morning at Diagon Alley. The Undesirable posters lining the walls had all been gratified over, so that the image of Harry Potter, tweaking his glasses and blinking out at the average passer-by, was no longer headed with Undesirable No.1. Instead, the posters read, Next Minister For Magic.
Shop front after shop front, row after row, the Ministry-issued posters showed Harry winking and smiling and sighing under various political slogans singing of his former greatness. Each one called for him to be made the Minister For Magic. And although a few wizards and goblins scoffed or groaned or tore down the posters as they passed them, the majority of shoppers and business-keepers picked up their pace and kept their heads down. Occasionally, a person would smile slyly at the wanted-posters-turn-propaganda.
"I swear it wasn't me," George said, raising both hands. His younger brother, Ron, rested against the counter of Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes, which was crowded with small honking contraptions that made a sound whenever Ron opened his mouth to speak. It just seemed like something George might have done, reminiscent of the U-No-Poo gimmick of his youth. "It was a bloody good idea, though," he acknowledged.
"Well, whoever is doing it will be in a hell of a lot of trouble when they're caught," Ron said, but whatever else he had to add was lost under the honking of a small, muggle rubber duck on the counter.
George lowered his voice to no more than a mutter, leaning forward to speak to Ron. "I guess the tides are turning. People are beginning to miss Harry."
"One person bewitching wanted posters does not count for a tide turning," Ron replied sternly. He ran a hand over his face and sighed. "Anyway, I'm only here to do some Christmas shopping."
"To think, I was under the impression you came for a friendly visit," George grinned, walking around the counter and ushering him to his newest stock. "Got everything you need, from colour-changing Pygmy Puffs to a state-of-the-art Snowstorm Creator. You lot are hosting Christmas this year, aren't you?"
Ron peered at the flashy boxes and nodded tiredly. "Yep. Got an extra two guests too." He proceeded to fill George in on the two Slytherin boys staying in their house, much to his brother's amusement.
"Blimey. Zabini and Mafloy hanging out with the Weasleys? This has to be a first."
"Mind you, they're not entirely bad. But once a Malfoy, always a Malfoy. Right?"
"Right," George agreed, passing a small purple box into Ron's hand. "Put that in his pudding and we'll sort him out for good."
Ron was highly tempted, turning the mysterious purple box over, before returning it to his brother. "Nah, Hermione will kill me."
He finished up the Christmas shopping, argued with George about a discount that he didn't get, and hurried back into the windy gale ripping through Diagon Alley. Still, as he hurried to the Leaky Cauldron, he couple help but smile slyly at the flapping posters of Harry, each of them reading Next Minister For Magic.
It began snowing on Christmas Eve. Hogwarts had already been blanketed in a thick sheet of snow, but Devon had not had the snow stick right up until the day before Christmas. It layered the ground and turned the hilly landscape into a white, desert tundra. By Christmas morning, everything had frozen over, turning the trees into glittery ornaments.
It was around ten in the morning when Scorpius and Zabini left the castle and travelled down to the Three Broomsticks to floo to the Weasley's living room, their permission slips in their pockets. Scorpius did not need his parent's signature, as he was already seventeen. Zabini, of course, had forged his permission slip.
There was a certain amount of nerves between them and they squabbled about who would go first. Unsurprisingly, it was Malfoy.
"See you in a minute," Zabini said, hoisting his bag onto his shoulder. Scorpius rolled his eyes. He stepped into the fireplace with a handful of green powder and thought of his destination.
"The Weasley Bungalow!"
He arrived with an explosion of soot and an explosion of colour. The Weasley's living room had been decorated so thoroughly it looked like a Christmas card had vomited on it. There was an enormous evergreen conifer crammed into the corner, and it was so large its topmost branches scrapped the roof. Paper chains that shone from blue to purple hung across the ceiling in great, tangled webs. The sofa was adorned with overstuffed green and red cushions and the floor was crowded with gifts. It was all a lot to take in. But, front and centre, big grins across their faces, were Rose and Hugo Weasley in matching red and green jumpers.
"Finally," Hugo cried, grabbing Scorpius' arm and pulling him out of the fireplace. The enthusiasm was startling. Rose grabbed his trunk, and just in time too, for Zabini appeared in its place a moment later.
The house smelt good—something was cooking—but before anyone could comment on this, Hermione Granger emerged from the kitchen. Her hands were in her bushy hair as she pulled it back into a ponytail. Like the overwhelming riot of colour, Hermione assaulted the boys with a storm of hospitality.
"It's lovely to see you again, Scorpius. And this must be André Zabini," Hermione said warmly. "Would you like any tea? Help yourself, everything's on the coffee table. You can pop your things upstairs in the study, Ron has set up a couple of camp beds in there so you can stay the night."
She was already walking across the room, past the staircase, towards a room on the lower floor. She spoke over her shoulder the entire time. "I'll be putting an Undetectable Extension Charm on this room, so I'll need you all to clear out for a few minutes. But head along into the backyard, the Potters are already there."
Both the Slytherins stood there, blinking rapidly.
"Er, I suppose we should…" Zabini trailed off, raising the bag. Hugo took it from him. "I'll put your bags upstairs. Go ahead outside and I'll catch up with you."
Rose smiled and patted her brother's head as he played lackey. Privately, Scorpius wondered how she had bribed him to respond so obediently. He and Zabini followed Rose out the back door into the chilly morning air. The Potter siblings were certainly present. James was waving his wand like a baton, conjuring up snowmen from the white powdery ground. Lily was shoving stick arms into one of the snowmen when the three Slytherins arrived at the top of the porch.
"All hail the Snakes," James called, giving his wand a final flourish before tucking it into his pocket. He looked far better rested than he had been in weeks. There was a clatter from a shed on the far right, and a moment later Albus Potter emerged with a broom in hand, cawing with excitement. He dropped the broom and raced over to the porch, almost slipping, before throwing his arms around Scorpius' neck.
"The lovers reunite," Zabini sighed. "What's with the snowmen?"
He approached James, who was eyeing Zabini with some caution, before Lily jumped in with the explanation of what a family snowball fight consisted of. In the meantime, Scorpius interrogated both Rose and Albus.
"The rest of your family knows I'll be here, right? They will all be attending tonight's dinner?"
"I wouldn't fret about it," Albus replied candidly.
"He's memorised our family tree," Rose told Albus.
Albus turned away, as if he couldn't take this piece of information. "Don't even."
"Both your matriarchal and patriarchal lines," Scorpius replied, his voice empty of emotion. He could tell that Albus wasn't sure whether he was joking. Well, Scorpius wasn't. He had memorised their family tree.
"Are we having a snowball game, or what?" James called, throwing his hands up. Rose and Albus linked their arms through Scorpius' and dragged him down the porch steps. His boots sunk into the snow.
They broke up into team. James insisted on being a leader, as did Rose, and they chose their members accordingly. Rose took Albus, Zabini and Malfoy. James took Hugo and Lily. Having Scorpius on the team was somewhat a casualty, as he had never participated in a snowball fight before. Rose had him build a fort behind the tire swing tree while she talked strategy. The rules were whoever got to the porch first won, and they had to get there without getting hit by a snowball. If you were hit, you returned to the base and started over.
Surprisingly, it was Lily and Hugo who dominated on the ground. They worked like a well-oiled machine—Hugo creating perfectly round snowballs which Lily then threw with missile-precision. They were hiding behind the tool shed, which was further away from the porch, then the tire swing tree, but gave a better scope of the garden. Every time any of Rose's team tried to get around the tree they were plummeted with snowballs. With Lily ad Hugo as his defence mechanism, James had already managed to sneak up to the garden bed.
"We need to get Lily," Albus seethed. "Her aim is deadly."
"Once we cut them off we'll get Rose to the porch."
"Leave it to me," Zabini promised, ducking low and sprinting around the circumference of the garden. Several snowballs were lobbed at his head, but they missed. He disappeared from sight.
Rose was shaking her head wildly now, as she aimed snowball after snowball at James. Albus was manufacturing them as fast as he could.
"I shouldn't be the runner," Rose said. "I'm not quick enough. Get Scorpius."
"We may only have one shot at this," Albus warned.
Scorpius was panicky. "I can't do it! I've never had a snowball fight before!"
"Sad," Albus agreed. "Tragic even."
Rose ducked around the tree, but the moment she was past the tire swing, one of Lily's snowballs hit her right in the jaw. She retreated behind the tire again.
"All you have to do is run to the porch without getting hit. Think of the snowballs like Bludgers."
"Usually you're there to beat away the bludgers."
"Just go," Rose whispered. "Go!" she yelled, much more loudly, and not for him.
There was a squeal on the far right that could only belong to Lily. Rose and Albus gave Scorpius a push and he went sliding out from behind their base, sprinting low towards the porch. Rose and Albus were behind him, his back up, plummeting James with snowballs. Two of James' snowballs skimmed the top of his wavy blond hair without a proper hit before James was taken out and had to return to the shed. Scorpius kept running. He reached the top of the porch steps and swung onto it, heart pounding. He raised his skinny arms above his head, triumphant. It had happened in less than ten seconds.
Rose and Albus whooped, jumping up and down, their feet crunching the snow. Zabini had grabbed Lily around the waist and thrown her over his shoulder, explaining where the squealing had come from. He had used his free hand to upend a bucket filled with snow onto Hugo's head. His curls were covered in the chilly white powder, which fell onto his coat as he shook out his hair. James had his hands on his hips, shaking his head at the others, as if he were suddenly the responsible parent in the debacle.
For the first time, Scorpius truly understood what they meant by a Weasley-Potter Christmas being a spiritual experience. Snow was beginning to fall again, soft and too wet to stick. Zabini placed Lily on her feet under the tire tree, where she proceeded to throw snowball after snowball at him. Rose and Albus had jumped onto James' back and tackled him into the fine, two inches of powder.
James struggled to get out from under the human pyramid he had formed the base of and was dusting off his jeans with his mitten-clad fingers. He faced Scorpius, who shrunk down to the bottom step of the porch.
"Best of three," James decided.
As much as Scorpius had enjoyed the snowball fights, he was beginning to crave a fireside cup of cocoa.
They took a break from hurling icy missiles at each other, Albus insisting that these 'preliminary rounds' hardly counted compared to the matches between the entire family. Instead, they set about finding a gnome to put on top of the Christmas tree, which was apparently a Weasley tradition. Zabini was offered the honours of pinning down a gnome, which he took on eagerly.
Rose moseyed up beside Scorpius, bumping her shoulder against his. "Alright there?"
"Positively grand," he replied, staring out at the garden. Rose leaned her arm against his. The contact in their current surroundings made him blush. He leaned away. "We need to be discreet."
"Discretion is my middle name," Rose winked. "Rose Discretion Weasley. Still better than both Hyperion and Severus."
Scorpius laid a hand over his heart, as if he was mortally wounded by the comment. He retreated towards the back door. "I might head in for a bit. Your mum might want help with that Extension Charm."
Rose raised her eyebrows. "You're rubbish at charms. Have you even cast an Extension Charm before?"
"No," Scorpius admitted, a bit keen, "but I would love to see her do it."
"Alright," Rose assented, smirking a little as Zabini took a dive and collided with the garden shed. "We'll catch up in a bit once we've caught ourselves a gnome."
Scorpius headed back into the living room, discretion the last thing on his mind, and was surprised to find that the Extension Charm had already been taken care of. The room was now double the size—the sofa had been pushed aside and two long tables were set up down the middle. Red napkins were rolling themselves into fancy designs and lining themselves down the placemats. Hermione Granger was no longer in the room, though. Instead, Ron Weasley was wrestling with the enormous conifer, all its ornaments jingling while pine needles rained down on top of his ginger-grey hair.
"Er, Mr Weasley?" Scorpius tried, coming around the other side of the tree. Ron Weasley flinched at his voice. He did not disentangle with the Christmas tree. Instead, he muttered bloody thing won't stand up straight and pretended Scorpius wasn't there. Still, the awkwardness was palpable and Scorpius could not ignore it. "Would you, er…like some help?"
Ron grunted in reply, clearly avoiding having to agree or even speak directly to Scorpius, but also in no position to refuse. Scorpius used his wand to straighten the tree's spine, and then used another spell to balance the weight of the tree's base so it would stand stock-still.
"How'd you do that?" Ron demanded, taking a few steps back and shaking the needles out of his red hair.
"Er, I use that spell on our Crackling Crab Apple Trees so they grow straight," Scorpius said, feeling ridiculously foolish. "It also works on hedges."
Ron nodded slowly, begrudgingly impressed. The top of the tree bent like a fishing rod, forced against the ceiling. "Should've trimmed it first," Ron muttered.
"I can…erm, I mean, I could do that if you like."
"Well," Ron said, tempted to agree. "If you want to."
A little while after, Hermione returned from upstairs, a box of decorations floating at wandpoint. She cried out in indignation when she saw Scorpius standing precariously on a stool, using his wand to slice the top of the tree.
"What are you doing, Scorpius? You'll fall and get hurt—"
"It's fine, Ms Granger. I trim the hedges at our place all the time."
"Please, call me Hermione," she said, putting down the box. "And honestly, you don't have to—"
"He offered," Ron replied, returning to the room with a few mugs of tea. "Let the boy prune the tree if he wants to, Hermione."
"Ron, he is our guest."
"Our other guest is out there in the snow trying to pin a gnome to the ground," Ron said sipping his tea. "So I think Scorpius chose the more dignified way to help."
Scorpius didn't say anything to this. He kept his back to both of them and continued to clip the tree until it no longer touched the ceiling. Still, he was pleased to hear Rose's father refer to him by his first name and not his last. When he was finished, he carefully clambered off the stool. Just as his feet touched the floorboards, he heard Hugo call, "He's got it!"
The tree was now properly in order, the roast was in the oven, the table was decorated with Christmas Cracker Bon-Bons and all was well. The children sat about one of the tables, drinking hot chocolate and waiting excitedly for the rest of the guests to arrive.
The first people to make it—several hours early—were Teddy Lupin and Victoire Weasley. It was no surprise they were the first to arrive either. Victoire was swathed in an Invisibility Cloak, which Teddy took off her the moment they were through the door, pretending he was performing a muggle magic trick. Clearly, extracting her from wherever it was she was hiding had been quite a task. He threw the Cloak over one arm—causing it to vanish—and explained to James Potter (who had answered the door) that he needed to head right back to headquarters to return the Cloak to his father and was really rather in a rush to leave.
He then stood, gobsmacked, to see a Malfoy sitting at the neatly set dinning table.
"Well," Teddy said, sweeping around his god-brother and thumping a hand against the table. "This one clearly doesn't belong to us."
"No," Scorpius agreed, fidgeting.
"If it isn't Scorpius Hyperion Malfoy. My old foe and comrade."
"Are you being intentionally paradoxical?"
"Are you being intentionally a prat?" Teddy replied, taking the seat opposite him.
His hair was not blue, as it usually was. Instead, it was green, with the tips a frosted white, giving him a striking resemblance to a Christmas tree.
"How is it you find yourself in the Weasley Bungalow?"
"He was invited," Zabini said. "As was I."
"A complete stranger," Teddy said, nodding towards Zabini. "Gone were the days where I recognised the relatives at our own family functions."
Victoire Weasley came to their rescues at that moment, taking the Invisibility Cloak and shaking it over Teddy's head. "You were in a rush, weren't you?"
"Indeed, I was," Teddy said, taking the Cloak. "I'll be back in ten minutes."
"Please, take your time," Victoire sighed.
Teddy scooped up the Cloak and scooted out of the way, but not before cornering Rose by the door. She blinked at him steadily, her face turning pink under his knowing gaze.
"Malfoy's here," he said quietly, as if she may not have noticed.
"So is Zabini," she said evenly.
"But Zabini isn't your secret boyfriend," Teddy whispered. "So I would be careful."
"You promised not to say a thing," she hissed as he opened the door.
Teddy mimed himself zipping up his lips, locking them with a key and then throwing the key over his shoulder. When Rose went to warn him further, he only pointed at his tightly pressed lips and shrugged before slipping out the door. With a heavy sigh, she returned to the table.
The moment Teddy was out the door, everyone fell upon Victoire to hail her with congratulations. Lily practically propelled herself into her cousin's arms. For a good few seconds, she looked utterly stunned, as if she thought she was being congratulated for finally leaving the house. It took her a moment to cotton on.
"Right, the wedding," she said, prying Lily's arms from round her neck. "Merlin, I forgot."
"You forgot about your own wedding?" Albus snorted.
"I forgot people cared," Victoire corrected, rolling her eyes.
Scorpius did not really know Victoire, but like all the Weasleys, he was familiar with her. Her, especially, for she had often been in the society pages of Isabella's magazines. She was leggy, athletic and blonde, with veela looks and fame to her name. She had been splashed across the papers both by paparazzi and her own merits as a reporter. However, her face was most familiar from the wanted posters he had grown accustomed of seeing. She was a whistle-blower. A rebel. Everything Scorpius feared and admired.
She took the seat beside him. "I hope you're not going to sell me out," she said to the two Slytherins.
"Wouldn't dream of it," Zabini replied, shuffling Hugo's deck of cards. "Now, who wanted to play a round of Exploding Snap?"
This arrested the other's attention thoroughly, but Scorpius remained on the periphery, watching instead. Victoire smiled at him weakly. Because neither of them was participating, this somehow put them on par.
"I'm assuming you're both friends with Rose?" she said. She nodded towards Zabini, who was snapping his hand over's Lily's. "You and that kid?"
"Zabini," he clarified. "And yes."
Victoire smirked a little, brushing her hair behind her ear. "Do you usually have big family Christmases at the Malfoys?"
"Er, no."
"Well…prepare yourself. The Weasley clan like to get involved in everyone else's business. I would know," she added, raising her eyebrows.
Scorpius decided he would excuse himself at that moment, perhaps because he was beginning to sweat at the notion of being interrogated by the Weasley family collectively. He made his excuse and slipped away from the table, entering the kitchen instead, looking for a little refuge.
"Who's arrived? They always show up early," Hermione complained. The radio was, mercifully, playing a jazzy Christmas song. The stream of news had been haltered. The kitchen was better for it. It was crammed with food, dishes upon dishes that had been prepped all morning. Scorpius walked over to the sink and began peeling potatoes while Hermione drizzled olive oil in a pan. "I always tell them to come at one and yet..."
"It must be a Weasley thing," Scorpius said, peeling the potatoes by hand. Hermione Granger jumped and turned around. Naturally, with her back turned, she had assumed she was talking to one of her own children. She smiled apologetically.
"Oh Scorpius, you surprised me. What do you mean, a Weasley thing?"
"Rose showed up early to my New Year's party last year," Scorpius remarked, putting the potatoes in the pan. "Well, she showed up right on time. To the minute. She was the first to arrive."
"Oh, well, that was probably my fault," Hermione admitted. She began spicing the vegetables. She did not cook with magic. He had noticed this throughout the morning. She had used her wand to stir the sauce and get the pot's temperature right, but never used it to prep. He, too, enjoyed cooking the muggle way. There was method to it. "You don't need to help out, Scorpius. You're our guest."
The hubbub beyond the kitchen was growing steadily louder. He could hear Rose's voice rise and fall, abrupt and bubbly, like the sauce on the stove. Her mother turned around, bumping the oven door shut with her hip. "What is Christmas like with your family?" she asked kindly.
She asked everything kindly. It always left him feeling a bit flustered. Rose was never this genial.
"It's, er, nice I suppose. Just dinner with the immediate family."
"I suppose this will be quite different," she smiled, taking off her oven mitts. The jazzy Christmas number was wrapping up. "You really ought to go and enjoy yourself."
"I—" he frowned, blinking at her warm, brown eyes. She was the very essence of maternity. It was confronting. Scorpius cleared his throat. "I don't do well in crowds," he stated.
"So, go find a nice nook in the sofa and hang about someone you like," Hermione encouraged. "No need to mingle, really."
No need to mingle. He told himself this as he ducked out of the kitchen door, but he really didn't seem to have a choice. The room had filled up considerably. Not only were the Potters there, but the rest of Victoire's family had arrived—her brother, sister and parents. Roxanne Weasley and her family were there too—others that he recognised by face. He knew that this wasn't even half of them.
Scorpius slipped past the group, the heat in his face, making a beeline for the staircase. If only he could find Rose and Albus, he might be able to escape somewhere quiet for a little while. Work up some courage.
Instead of finding his friends, he bumped into someone who—at first—did not look in any way related to the rest of the family. The woman was in her early twenties, with bleached blonde hair that was almost as fair as his own. She did not look festive; she was almost entirely in black, including even her fingernails, and she was sucking absently on the end of a candy cane. He hastily went through the family tree in his head. This was the only Weasley cousin that he did not know or had never seen, which meant she had to be the elusive Molly Weasley.
Molly raised her eyes, her lips popping on the end of the candy cane. "So it's true," Molly mused. "Ferret Junior has come to steal Christmas."
Scorpius took a sharp breath and turned to walk away. Molly spoke up quickly. "That was me being amicable," she said. "If anyone here is unlikely to judge you, it's me. I'm all for not judging books by covers."
Scorpius turned back to her, chewing the inside of his lip sceptically. "How does my cover sell me?"
Molly considered him under her clear-framed spectacles. "Spoilt, pampered, pretentious and raised to harbour the quiet elitism of your parents," she said, unblinkingly.
"You hit the nail on the head."
Molly smirked. She bit off the end of the candy cane so it crunched under her teeth. "I think there's a lot more to you than that, Ferret boy. Let me guess. You have always had a complex to prove yourself and a desperate need to remain impartial."
"Let me guess," Scorpius said, some of his confidence coming back. "You bleached your hair blonde so you could be set apart from all your red-head cousins, and you've always had a desperate need to rebel in order to assert your freedom."
Someone whistled behind him. "He has you pegged."
Scorpius turned sharply. It was Roxanne's older brother, Fred. In all his life, he had never spoken to Scorpius. Now, he was giving him a diffident smile. "You better go find some better company, Malfoy. Molly is inhumanly cruel."
"I'm amicable," she insisted. "And he's hard to read." She nodded towards Scorpius, her dark eyes intent.
Fred offered Scorpius a candy cane, which he took before leaving.
He walked swiftly through the room. There was a lot of red heads, and he and Molly were the only ones that stood out—unlike her, it was not by his choice. The doorbell rang. More people were to arrive. A few heads turned his way as he pushed past them. He needed to be somewhere small and quiet and perfectly contained. He walked straight into the laundry and shut the door behind him.
The laundry was clouded with smoke and freezing cold. It was also where he found André Zabini with Roxanne Weasley.
"What're you two doing in here?" he snapped, leaning against the folded up ironing board and taking in deep breaths.
Zabini had cracked one of the windows open and was holding a lit cigarette out of it. Roxanne was standing by him, wearing a red beanie that slouched over her dark curls.
"Chatting," Roxanne offered. "Molly's being a pain in the arse, so I'm waiting for the Finnigans to arrive so Rowan can get her act half decent—"
"Put that out," Scorpius barked at Zabini. "It's disgusting. And disrespectful to smoke in somebody else's home."
His heart was pounding so hard now that he was finding it hard to focus. Neither of them were grasping what was happening. In fact, both Zabini and Roxanne rolled their eyes at his reaction, even though Zabini relented, tossing the cigarette out the window. He drew his wand to dissolve the smoke.
"You need to loosen up, Malfoy," Roxanne remarked, giving him a little punch in the shoulder. "This is supposed to be fun. Isn't that why you're spending the holidays here?"
"Get Rose," he said quietly. It felt as if he was breathing through a straw. He began to massage his sternum.
"Why'd you need—"
"Go find either Albus or Rose now and send them in here," he shouted.
He closed his eyes and leaned against the ironing board. The candy cane was still gripped in his left hand. They would all think he was some sort of fool, an out of place charity case. Or worse…they would think he was the son of a Death Eater. He was usually so good at controlling his breathing, controlling his emotions. This was the very worst place to have a breakdown.
He felt a hand squeeze his shoulder and opened his eyes. Rose was standing in front of him, her blue eyes sharply focused. "What's the matter?"
"Someone's hexed me, I think," he panted, shaking a little. "My heart is racing."
Albus stepped up beside Rose, also frowning at Scorpius. Rose grabbed Scorpius' thin wrist and pressed her fingers against it.
"You're having an anxiety attack," Albus said slowly. "Focus on taking deep breaths. You're safe, everyone here likes you and there's no need to be worried about their opinions." He turned to Rose, who was still pressing her fingers against Scorpius' wrist. "Do you even know how to take someone's pulse?"
"No," Rose admitted, withdrawing her hand. "I think I should cast a Cheering Charm."
The panic Scorpius had been feeling reared up like a tidal wave. He started so violently he almost knocked over the ironing board. "No. No Cheering Charms."
"It'll help you calm down," Rose said, taking his shoulder again.
"No! I don't want to be under the—the—the influence of a Charm when I meet your entire family."
"Albus is great at Cheering Charms. He won't over do it."
"I agree, I think it'll help," Albus added, drawing his wand.
"I'm perfectly fine, thanks," Scorpius said. "I'm relaxed, now, see? Honestly, if I were any more relaxed, I'd be in a comatose state."
When Scorpius, Albus and Rose emerged five minutes later from the laundry, Scorpius was far calmer than he had been upon entering it. He was so relaxed that his entire body felt a bit too loose. He wasn't ever one to grin, but he couldn't help the pleased, smug smile that stretched his cherub lips tight cross his face.
Zabini and Roxanne were waiting on either side of the laundry door like body guards, and the moment the trio emerged, they converged about him.
"Feeling better?" Roxanne asked.
"Frankly, I'm feeling better than I have in my entire life," Scorpius said, patting her shoulder.
"Cheering Charm," Albus added in an undertone. "Just the one."
The room was packed with people of all ages, most familiar by face even if Scorpius had never interacted with them before. James Potter was weaving throughout them with an arm over Lorcan's shoulders. "Well, we have enough people to play a proper snowball fight. Are we going to do it before dinner, or what?"
"Alright," Rowan Finnigan agreed, getting to his feet. "As long as I'm not on Molly's team."
"You slick prat," Molly huffed, also getting to her feet. "You know I'll finish you off if you're against me."
James was already half way through the back door, his wand out, Transfiguring the army of snowmen he had built earlier in the day. They all sprung to life, and there was something quite menacing about their flat, rock-shaped eyes. Scorpius nervously said he might sit out the first round, but half a dozen Weasley's grabbed hold of him and dragged him into the back garden.
"Ferret's love the snow. C'mon Malfoy."
Chilled from the snow and aching from laughter, Albus and Scorpius decided to sit out the final snowball fight, instead creeping up to the porch to watch. A few others had pulled out the round before, either because it was too cold or they were sick of being plummeted by the army of snowmen. James and Lily were really in their element this time.
Scorpius watched Albus as his green, smiling eyes darted from the faces of his family members to his friends. He wrapped an arm around Scorpius' shoulder.
"We're not a bad bunch, are we?" he asked.
"You're all brilliant," Scorpius acknowledged, looking at them all. He watched Zabini and Rose corner Angus Finnigan, lobbing snowball's from behind so he was forced to retreat to the base once more. Rose whooped, jumping onto Zabini's back and laughing. Albus squinted at them both, some of the warmth leaving his eyes.
Scorpius spoke in a careful, low voice. "You don't like having Zabini here, do you?"
"I wouldn't say he's my favourite person," Albus replied genially, wrapping his coat around him more tightly. "But I don't dislike him."
"Even though he kissed Imogen?" Scorpius tried, watching Albus carefully.
"I'm not Imogen's father," Albus scolded, glancing over his shoulder peevishly. "It's none of my business who kisses her."
"Right. But you're friends."
"Exactly. Friends. Mates. I'm not going to tell her who she can and cannot snog."
"He also snogged your ex-girlfriend while she was still dating you," Scorpius pointed out. In fact, Scorpius would be willing to bet he did more than snog her.
Here, Albus paused and actually turned around to assess Zabini, where he was now tugging on a hat with large elf ears attached to it. He was examining his reflection in the mirror, looking pleased with himself, while Rose browsed a rack of donated clothes. They were chatting in low voices.
"He did," Albus allowed slowly. "But I needed a reason to break up with her. He did me a bit of a favour."
It seemed as if Albus was determined to see the very best in people, something that Scorpius found highly amusing. He laughed a little and leaned the wooden panels of the porch. His reaction finally got Albus' attention, and he turned with a bit of a curious look in his eyes.
"Do you want me to hate Zabini?"
"I just find it amusing that you don't dislike anyone," Scorpius drawled, smirking now.
"I dislike people!"
"Who?"
Albus paused to think, almost comically stumped for an example. "Er…I dislike Gladstone."
"Someone you actually know," Scorpius insisted.
Again, Albus went quiet, thinking hard. He stroked a pair of leather gloves as he thought about it. Finally, he said, "I dislike Nathan Corner."
"Everyone dislikes Nathan Corner," Scorpius dismissed. "I mean someone you really dislike. Someone you cannot stand."
Albus tossed the gloves aside, exasperated now. He shook his head a little. "I like everyone, okay? I am too nice for my own good."
This was the answer Scorpius had been looking for. He smirked, bumping his shoulder against Albus. "Truly, it's a shock that you weren't in Huffle—"
Albus held up a hand, silencing his slight. His head turned over his shoulder, dark brows drawn together. Scorpius stopped too. The sound of everyone's cheering and exclamations and snow hitting parkers and fabric took precedence for a moment, followed by two very low voices. The laundry window backed up to the porch, and it was still cracked slightly open from where Zabini had been smoking out of it.
"Harry isn't going to make it tonight."
"You're joking—he promised—"
"Whisper, Ron, honestly. He's taking the patrol—Luna offered but he wanted it."
It was Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley. They, too, seemed to use the laundry to argue.
"Is this about those posters?"
"Of course not. He's just…"
"Avoiding us?"
"It'll happen soon enough. I think he wanted to do it before Christmas, but the wedding…"
"Right. We don't want another funeral before…"
"Well, we don't want another funeral, full stop."
Albus frowned towards the window, then turned to face the snowball fight again, the serious expression still tight on his face. He patted Scorpius' chest and moved to stand. Scorpius caught his arm, holding him there.
"Have you seen your father these holidays?" he asked.
Albus shrugged him off. He gave Scorpius a tired smile, one that wasn't entirely genuine. "I can tell you one thing, mate," he said, adamantly avoiding the question. "After school last year, I really disliked my father. Really. I'm sure you remember that. So, don't say I like everyone."
He pushed his way back into the house and Scorpius let him go, some of his concern rubbing against his contentment.
But bad news aside, Scorpius could not help but feel delighted. The feeling only intensified when it was two-thirty in the afternoon, and the forty or so guests settled into the crammed dinning tables like clockwork. The food was intense. Baked potatoes, roast beef with Yorkshire puddings, honey roast carrots, Brussels sprouts and of course, the roast turkey in the centre. Rose was almost salivating. The food was home-cooked and heavy with freshly made gravy and warm bread rolls. It was a feast for the eyes as well as the palette.
The tables were separated into the "oldies" and the younger crowd, conveniently situating Scorpius between Rose and Albus. They were packed in so tight, every time he moved his elbows to cut his roast, he would bump Rose in the ribs. People ate boisterously, passing dishes and yelling over one another until the volume rivalled The Great Hall. He and Zabini, as guests, were starry eyed. Zabini had never seen so much food with exception to Hogwarts' banquets, and Scorpius had never seen such an eclectic mix of company.
James' insistence to rehash the memory of Draco Malfoy The Amazing Bouncing Ferret over lunch happened to save the day.
"You've heard this one, haven't you, Malfoy?" James grinned, picking up a sandwich.
"The Amazing Bouncing Ferret?" he ascertained.
"Yes, yes. It features your old man," James said, grinning twitchily. "So, picture this. Fourth year. The legendary Mad Eye Moody is teaching at Hogwarts—"
"It was actually Barty Crouch Jr. in disguise," Lily piped up.
"Please stop ruining my brilliant storytelling with inane details," James said, silencing his sister with a wave of his hand. She crossed her arms surlily. "So, your dad was there being a git and making fun of Harry's dead mum. Harry gives his usual sassy quip in return and goes to leave."
"Ah, yes," Albus sighed wistfully. "Dad's sassy quips are a theme throughout all of his youth."
The conversation had gotten a few of the adult's attention. Ron Weasley was peering over at them from where he was speaking to his older brother, George. Albus' mother, Ginny, had also paused mid conversation to listen in.
"Then," James continued, raising both hands for suspense, "While his back was turned, your dad tries to hex him."
"Typical Slytherin," Zabini approved, nodding. "That's what I would do."
"Of course, Moody sees this underhand attack and goes absolutely mental. He charges in on his limpy, wooden leg and points his wand at Malfoy and—"
Ron let out a deep chuckle. Everyone turned to look at him at the adult's table one over. He grinned—and Scorpius noticed that it was Rose's big goofy grin, stretching from freckled cheek to cheek—and finished the story with relish. "And he Transfigures him into this white ferret, bouncing him around the bloody courtyard like a basketball. I could have wet myself for laughing."
"Ron," Hermione scolded, glancing at Scorpius.
But Scorpius was relieved; for these were the first words Ron had spoken to Scorpius without scorn.
"It was a bloody spectacle, Hermione. Even you loved it."
"It certainly explains my father's distaste for ferrets," Scorpius added nervously, appealing to Ron's better nature. "Of course, he has a similar loathing for Hippogriffs."
At this, Ron really began to laugh, grabbing his wife's arm. "Remember the Hippogriff thing, Hermione? Remember when he went around the castle pretending he couldn't use his bloody arm? Merlin, that wimp."
If Scorpius had to throw his dad under the bus in order to gain Ron Weasley's favour, he would do it. At the end of the day, he needed to attain this man's approval through whatever means necessary. Rose rolled her eyes at her boyfriend, but he knew what he was doing.
This triggered a great rehashing of stories, anecdote after anecdote. Some were told by the adults—remember the time Luna commentated a Quidditch match, she said that Zacharias Smith was suffering from Loser's Lurgey—oh yes, and I quite think he was, too—oh, not as good as the time Fred and George set up a swamp in the school to get to Umbridge—that was brilliant, wasn't it? Others, were told by the youngest members at the party.
"Remember that time you made the toilet in the girl's dorm regurgitate so much—"
"Thank you, Teddy," Victoire cut in smoothly, placing her hands around his mouth to silence him. She looked to the others. "Remember when Dominique fell into the Black Lake and Hagrid had to dive in to get her?"
"I was in first year!" Dominique cried, her face going bright red. "Give me a break!"
"Not as good as the time James lost a bet and one of his Three Dares was to fly around the Quidditch pitch stark nude."
Lorcan barked out a laugh, thumping James on the back, who did not look the least bit embarrassed. He threw out his chest pompously. "Almost certain that's the reason McGonagall retired."
This then got everyone started on Quidditch, a conversation that dominated the table for twenty minutes.
"I'm just grateful that I never had to play against Rose during my time on the Quidditch team," Fred scoffed, motioning towards his younger cousin with a chicken drumstick. "I don't envy you lot."
"Lorcan was supposed to lead us into greatness," James agreed, thumping his friend on the back. "But we're all doubting him now that Slytherin have beaten us two years in a row."
"We wouldn't have won without you last year," Scorpius said, raising a glass.
"And we'll never let you forget it," Lorcan replied, toasting him back.
"Rose wouldn't have even gotten on the team if it weren't for Zabini," Malfoy said, gesturing towards his housemate.
"Well," Zabini said, elbows on the table. "I wouldn't have convinced Rose to join if it weren't for her knocking you out cold."
"This is how rumours start," Scorpius warned playfully.
"I didn't knock him out cold," Rose snorted, putting her fork down long enough to take a breath. "I just…punched him in the face."
"Incidentally," Albus jumped in, "Both Ron and Hermione punched your dad in the face."
"So what you're telling me," Scorpius said, raising his eyebrows, "is that violence is hereditary with you lot?"
"Absolutely," Roxanne grinned. "Runs in our genes."
"Except me," Molly called, picking at her salad. "I'm a pacifist."
The entire table erupted into groans.
This banter continued for most of the evening, until Hugo popped his Christmas cracker with Lily—showering everyone in fake snow—before pulling out a hideous bonnet that he put on. Then, conversation ceased as crackers were pulled and exploded. Albus won against Fred, and put on a rather dashing top hat. Rose beat Scorpius, but was so offended by the straw hat inside she insisted Scorpius wear it. All along the table, people were pulling crackers and reading out poor jokes.
As plates began to get stacked, Scorpius dutifully stood to help, receiving heckles from the rest of the group. He ignored them, collecting plates, refusing to listen to their instance that he was the guest. Feeling rather merry, he entered the kitchen with a stack.
It wasn't just Hermione this time. An older, shorter woman with doughy arms and a knitted cardigan was putting leftovers in containers, and a much older gentleman was opening up what looked to be a toaster.
Rose's grandparents. He recognised them in an instant. For her grandfather, in particular, had her eyes. Bright blue, with the slightest bit of gold around the rim. A pair of glasses had slid down his long nose—something else Rose had also inherited.
"I've got some plates," Scorpius said, feeling as if he should have been feeling far warier. Instead, he couldn't shake the ease of the Cheering Charm. He placed the plates by the sink. Both Molly and Arthur Weasley watched him, stunned, as if a Sphinx had wondered into their midst. Scorpius noticed the toaster properly this time. He tugged his straw hat off. "Look at that. You know, I don't think I've actually ever seen a toaster in person. You wouldn't happen to be taking is apart at any point, would you?"
Arthur Weasley blinked a few times. Scorpius came around to inspect the toaster.
"Well…eventually, I was going to," he croaked.
"I always found the cooking appliances in particular quite fascinating. Just clever, you know? Getting all these things to run on electricity like that. I suppose it doesn't even compare to things like iPhones and Apple Watches but I always found it interesting."
He smiled fondly at the toaster and patted it twice before looking up at the elderly man before him. He could not completely register the look on his face. Before he could ask, Hermione was back in the kitchen, the rest of the plates in her hand.
"Honestly," she cried, in what was swiftly becoming a mantra. "You're our guest. You're not supposed to be helping."
"I was just admiring the toaster. Brilliant, really. In third year, I wrote an entire essay on the history and mechanics of the muggle blender."
"You took Muggle Studies?" Arthur Weasley blinked.
"Of course," Scorpius replied promptly. "Still am. Currently taking it at N.E.W.T. level."
Again, he struggled to read Arthur's reaction, but had little time to processes it. Hermione was setting a sponge onto the first batch of plates with her wand. "Head back out, Scorpius. Pudding will be ready in a bit."
He complied, giving a final, wistful look at the toaster.
Soon, everyone was plied with so much food that they were fit to burst. Eyes were getting droopy. Angus Finnigan fell asleep on Rose's shoulder. Lysander and Hugo were playing a game of Gobstones by the fire. The mood was perfectly still, warm and comfortable. The house, even with its temporary Extension Charm, was too small to accommodate so many people. The effect was not a negative one, though. At the manor, Scorpius was likely to lose himself. Here, it was almost impossible to be out of the ear or eyeshot of another.
Grandma Weasley was handing out a collection of jumpers that was so huge, it was almost a mountain of wool. Albus was given his in green, the letter A on the front. Rose's was a dark maroon, which she rolled her eyes at, before tugging onto her head. Molly, who had received a baby pink jumper with a grey letter M on the front, looked less likely to put hers on. As each jumper was distributed, Scorpius felt the artificial cheeriness begin to fade. It receded from the edges of his mind, leaving him cool and still.
Across the room, Rose watched him. She had been watching him all day. Watching the way he interacted with her cousins and parents; watched him make strange, witty remarks that coaxed out curious smiles; watched him carry plates to the kitchen and picking up bon-bon wrappers from the floor. His presence in the house was strange but comfortable, like a stray cat that had been welcomed over the threshold. He was hesitant but delighted.
Now, he was withdrawing. Rose watched him, then, too. He was still sitting at the table, holding a slip of parchment that had come from one of the Christmas crackers, undoubtedly with a poorly worded joke on it. His stare was intense, as if nothing was more important that that envelope and the action of his long fingers. It occurred to Rose how out of place he must have felt all day. The room was filled with freckled faces, a shocking amount of red heads and hand-knitted Weasley jumpers. Teddy was still yelling familiar stories from Christmases of years past and grandma Weasley was pulling out old photographs from Bill and Fleur's wedding while weeping about the war. Scorpius had always seemed frustrated to be excluded, but perhaps being included was worse.
Rose snuck out from under a sleeping Angus Finnigan and crossed the room to join Scorpius.
"Hey," she said, as she snatched the envelope from his hands. He looked up, startled. "Let's go outside for a moment."
He looked around nervously, as if expecting a relative to refuse their leave. But everyone was preoccupied in their familiar activities, and watching Scorpius Malfoy was the last thing on their mind. Slowly, he stood and Rose took his arm, leading him out of the room.
James' half melted snowmen dropped in the garden like sad little statues. They both shivered the moment they were on the porch. Now that it was late in the afternoon, the pale sun already low in the sky, the temperature had dropped further. Scorpius tucked his hands into his pockets as he admired the frosted garden.
"I don't have a greenhouse," Rose joked.
"You have a really nice home."
Rose pinched his side. "You seem down. What's the matter?"
Scorpius smiled, but it didn't reach his eyes. He sat down on the porch step, looking at the icy tire swing as it slowly swung in the breeze. After a second, Rose crouched down beside him. He hadn't replied. He looked like he was thinking over his answer.
"They all love you," she said, guessing that this may have been on his mind. "Even Molly is being surprisingly courteous. At least, that's her making an effort to be courteous."
Scorpius shook his head, indicating that that wasn't it. This time, Rose just waited. He would talk when he was ready.
"I enjoy Christmas with my family, truly," he eventually said. "I usually get spoilt rotten. It's just…"
He squinted at the face of the melted snowman nearest to him. Rose's hand crept into his jacket pocket, so she could find and squeeze his fingers. Scorpius sighed, his breath creeping into the air like steam.
"It's just, I've never done anything stupid or foolish. I have no exciting memories. I've done nothing moronic just for note."
Rose could not imagine how having never done something stupid was a cause for regret. In retrospect, she would. She would understand that foolish decisions often made the best stories, and her life—the lives that preceded it—were a web of foolish stories.
Rose checked that they weren't being watched before she grabbed Scorpius' jumper and pulled him to his feet.
"C'mon. I have something to show you," she said.
They hurried past the army of slushy snowmen, through the garden and out the back gate. Rose went to great pains to erase their footprints with a charm, but the moment they were out of the house's boundaries, she was forced to put her wand away. She wouldn't be able to get away with any underage magic.
They made their way down the lane behind the house, brambles dropping now on their heads.
"Where are we going?"
"Be patient."
"Your dad is going to kill us."
"We're making a foolish memory, you berk."
They continued on the familiar dirty path, which was now covered in half melted snow. Their boots sunk into the frosty carpet. By the time they reached their destination, their noses had turned a bright pink.
They stood at the quiet pond where they had shared their first proper kiss. It was frozen over with thin ice that broke to pieces around the bank, where reeds still danced in the light breeze. It was still and lovely and quiet, with not a soul about.
Scorpius stared at it in wonder before turning to Rose, who was taking a few more steps towards the pond's edge. He grabbed her wrist. "The ice isn't thick enough to walk on," he warned her.
"I know," Rose said. "That's why we're going to swim."
Scorpius turned sharply, alarmed. But Rose was utterly serious, and determined to be foolish. Once she checked the coast was definitely clear, she began to strip off her layers.
"Are you mental?"
"Once in a lifetime memory to be made," she said, dropping her Weasley jumper to the ground. She shivered, standing in nothing but a thin long-sleeve shirt and her jeans. She began to take those off, too. The skin on her back was covered in freckles and moles, split by the black lip of her bra. He noticed that she hadn't done the clip up properly, that only one hook was through the eye. It was such a silly detail to notice. He looked away, focusing on the icy chunks floating in the pond. Little did Scorpius know, this would be the first of two instances where he would see Rose in a state of undress in the months that followed.
"Well? I want to make this quick," Rose said, pulling off her boots.
Scorpius was clearly torn between resignation and embarrassment. He looked around, his pink face flushed, before he also began to tug off his jacket, then his jumper. "What the hell," he muttered, folding his clothes hastily and dropping them over Rose's. Seeing this, Rose cheered, and he immediately hushed her, looking around to see whether they had attracted an audience. The country pond was as still and isolated as ever.
They stood in their underwear, trembling, stepping up to the lake's edge. Out of a sense of modesty, they refused to look at each other. Instead, Scorpius grabbed Rose's shaking hands. The prospect of what they were about to do was not pleasant.
"This will be cold," Rose warned him.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Scorpius smile. He began to count. "One. Two—"
Rose tugged his arm, yanking him forward before he got to three. They hit the water.
It was a pain neither had known. Their heads broke the water a moment later. It was as if the blood had turned to ice in their veins, and their entire body was being pierced by blades.
"Fuck," Scorpius gasped. Rose had never heard him swear before. His teeth were chattering, his lips turning blue. His silver blonde hair and grey eyes only added to the image of him being frozen. Rose laughed through chattering teeth. Immediately, they both clawed their way over he slushy riverbank. Trembling, numb, they fumbled their way through their clothes.
"That was s-s-so s-stupid," Scorpius chattered.
She grinned. "Your lips are blue."
"So are yours," he said, buckling his belt.
He was useless at Charms, and it hardly worked, although her hair did slowly frizz back up. He extracted his wand from his jacket. He pointed it at Rose, steam drying her as she tugged on her shirt and jumper. He was terrible at charms, and all it did was frizz up her hair.
It took them a minute to recover all their layers, but soaked to the bone and trembling, they had yet to recover their body heat. Without speaking, Rose and Scorpius enveloped one another in a hug. Buried into the crook of his neck, Rose let his itchy jumper scratch her cheek. Her cold nose pressed against the heat of his neck. She burrowed her fingers into his pockets. They shivered together, sharing whatever warmth had surfaces in their goosepimpled flesh. Neither said a word. They lingered. Rose enjoyed their shared heat. Their skin began to thaw.
They finally drew back, some of the colour returned to their faces now. Scorpius' face softened into a smile.
"Happy Christmas."
"And a fantastic New Year," Rose quipped. "Let's go."
When Rose and Scorpius returned to the house—and they had only been missing for a total of fifteen minutes—they stumbled into the crossfire of wedding-planning quarrelling.
"You invited all of the dragon keepers?" Victoire exclaimed as the two Slytherins slipped into the lounge room. She was speaking to her parents, and the argument covered up the return of the missing duo.
"Well, we invited Charlie and you've invited Krishna," her father replied, his low voice even. "It seemed rude to just leave off the rest."
"Yoo were with zem for tree months, Victoire," her mother scolded.
"Three months isn't really a long time when you compare it to how long I've been alive," she corrected. "What happened to just family?"
"Zey are like your family!"
"Teddy, are you hearing this?" Victoire huffed, rounding the sofa to plant her hands on her shoulders. "All the handlers!"
"The more the merrier," he relented. "What does it matter at this point?"
"Next thing I know you'll be telling me Malfoy's invited," she muttered, gesturing to Scorpius, who had just perched on an armchair.
Teddy looked around before lunging across Lily and Simon Finnigan to squeeze Malfoy's shoulder tightly. He jumped, startled. Beside him, Rose stifled a laugh.
"I adore Malfoy. We're mates," Teddy said. "Of course I want him at our wedding!"
"Me?" Scorpius said blinking at him in confusion.
Teddy forced both Lily and Simon to move down the sofa so he could wrap an arm around Scorpius, who was far too stunned to do anything other than squint suspiciously at the green haired delinquent. "This kid," Teddy said, "is the reason I've changed my ways. That I've bettered myself."
"That's an exaggeration," Scorpius said quickly.
"We said family only!" Victoire cried, rolling her eyes in exasperation.
"Scorpius is family," Teddy insisted, his headlock not loosening at all.
At this, a few heads that weren't Victoire's also turned towards Teddy with sceptical looks. Rose and Albus were included in that number. Everyone was a little surprised to hear this. Rose in particular was sending Teddy a warning look.
"Scorpius is my second cousin," Teddy added as way of explanation. "My nan is your grandma's sister."
"Right," Scorpius said, nodding in surprise. In spite of studying Rose and Albus' family tree inside out, he had left Teddy Lupin off somehow. It had never occurred to him that they were, in fact, related. Everyone's eyes were on Scorpius again, and for the first time since his panic attack in the laundry, he was feeling anxious.
"Plus," Teddy rambled on, facing Albus and Rose. "He's your fourth cousin once removed because all of you are descendants of Phineas Nigellus Black."
"Phineas Nigellus Black! That's who's to blame for all this," Victoire cried out mockingly. She leaned down and kissed the top of Teddy's head. "Fine. Invite whom you want. But I'm choosing where everyone gets to sit."
"A splendid compromise," Teddy agreed. He leaned in, lowering his voice, muttering from the corner of his mouth. "You two go missing for fifteen minutes. You're lucky I covered for you."
"We were just in the garden," Rose said.
"Uh-huh," Teddy nodded, before propelling himself out of his seat.
"Blimey, you're family," Albus said, raising his eyebrows. "Well, this changes things, doesn't it?"
"Does it?" Rose asked quickly.
"Well, I think so," Lily piped up. "He's really one of us now!"
"I wouldn't go so far as to say that."
"Ignore Lily," Rose advised. "She wants to collect everyone she knows and add them to our clan's ensemble."
"Malfoy," Molly said, weaving across the room to him. She was here alone, without parents or siblings, and she would be leaving alone too. She looked down at him with her thinly plucked eyebrows. "Since you're part of the family, you can have this," she said, holding out the pink hand-knitted Weasley jumper.
"A-are you sure?"
"Positive. M for Malfoy, right?" she said, slinging her bag onto her shoulder. "And anyway, pink is far more your colour than mine."
The adults were beginning to collect their children, with promises that many of them would be back tomorrow for Boxing Day. Ron set a broom to start magically cleaning up the floors. After the slow build up and the strangely drawn out day, Scorpius was left with a hollow feeling of disappointment seeing everyone slowly leave. Scorpius fingered the pink wool of Molly's abandoned jumper. Under no circumstances could he imagine giving up something like this, no matter what the colour was.
A/N: I rewrote this chapter THREE times, what in the world. Originally Scorpius and Zabini were staying the whole holidays and I was like nah, that would never fly with the Weasleys. Anyway. Here it is. Part of this chapter was written so long ago, it was written in first person back when this story was still a Rose-centric first person draft.
I only did one proof read, so accept my typos as a gift. Splitting it here because it would get to long otherwise, but Boxing Day and wedding are coming up next! Review review review! I read all your reviews, even if I don't reply x
