Albus looked down at the parchment as he sat in his room, at his desk. His owl nudged his hand slightly, glancing from the paper to him. It held out his leg.
"No Eliza" he said to the deep black owl "Not yet." The letter was completely blank, all except for the name at the top. Zeph. He rested his head in his hands as he stared down at the letter.
That was all he was able to come up with. Zeph. Not even a dear or a hello, he just, he wasn't sure what to write. It glared back at him, taunting. In the waste basket was another letter. It was crumpled so it was no longer readable, but before it was damaged it was entitled Jillian.
Neither letter was coming easily. He drenched his brain, btu he wasn't sure what to say, wasn't sure what he wanted, and let it erode him. His owl looked at him at confusion, wondering why Albus would start these letters, but never give them to her to take anywhere. She cocked her head. He patted it lightly when there was a knock at the door.
"Al!" he heard a voice call. His brother's head popped in the door "Al! Mum says we're heading over to Uncle Ron's and Aunt-" but he stopped. Albus looked up at him, from the looming letter. "What's that Al?" his mischievous smile grew "Writing a letter? You never write letters?" he teased as Albus through it behind his back.
"It's nothing." Albus responded "I'll be down in a second." But this did not deter James who lunged at his brother.
"Why so embarrassed Al?" he asked as he and his brother crashed onto the floor, rolling around. "This for your little girlfriend? Huh? Is it for your girlfriend."
"YOU TWO!" they heard a small voice shout as their youngest sister Lily walked into the room. She looked younger than 13, but she had a sharper tongue than most of James or Albus's friends. The only one with a sharper tongue was Rose. "what are you doing!" she demanded "Mum is getting mad, and you know Dad wil be up here sooner or later if you don't get your fat arses down stairs!" She looked a bit annoyed.
That's when James took the chance to tear the letter from his brother's grasp, pressing him onto the ground.
"Zeph?" he said allowed. "Zeph?"
That's when Lily's interest was piqued. "Zeph?" she asked "From what I know, she's not your girlfriend." Now Albus's face was entirely red, it was practically a tomato.
"It's nothing." he shouted, finding the strength to shove his brother off and tear the letter out of his hands. Lily rolled her eyes.
"I'm going down stairs." She stated "Before this gets ugly." And at that she trode back down stairs to her parents, off to get both her brothers in trouble.
"Why are you writing to Zeph? Zeph Malfoy? Really?" his brother shook his head "I thought you had taste." He felt uncomfortable as his brother said it. "It's so strange to me, isn't it strange to you? I mean seriously, doesn't it bug you at all? All can think about is dad's conversations you know? It's almost like… betrayal." He said half-jokingly, but Albus heard some of the seriousness in his voice.
He had felt odd about the whole Zeph thing, he didn't know what to do, and no one, no one but Forest knew about the kiss. Albus swallowed. What if Scorpius found out?
"I mean, she's bloody fantastic," his brother was no longer messing around "funny, smart, hell of a voice, and not that hard on the eyes," Albus could tell James had been thinking about it for him "but I don't know. Don't you feel torn?" Albus didn't say anything, he sat silently, the letter clutched in his fist.
"JAMES AND ALBUS POTTER!" they heard a shout. It was their father. "Your mother sister and I have been waiting for nearly 20 minutes! We need to go! We don't want to miss Hugo's birthday!" he noticed they were on the floor "What, are you two doing?" he demanded.
Albus felt his stomach flip. How would his father feel about this? His father, who didn't exactly have the best relationship with the Malfoy's, what would he think? He looked over to his brother, wondering what he would say.
"Well, Albus was sitting around writing to Jillian, and so I tried to…" he lied, but their father cut him off.
"If I told you once," he began "I've told you a thousand times, DO NOT try and push yourself into your brother's private affairs."
Albus sat their shocked at his brothers lie.
"Yes dad." James responed.
"Ok," their father said, pleased with himself "Now let's head out shall we?"
Zeph sat on her porch, like she did every night. The sun was just setting as she breathed in the warm summer air. A dark brown owl flew over to her, landing on her right. She felt her heart leap. This could be it, this could be it. She had been hoping all summer to receive a letter from Albus. It dropped the letter and flew away.
She smiled, opening the letter, but then felt her heart drop through her stomach. Calix Lovegood, again. She groaned. Why couldn't he just use the same owl? That way she wouldn't get her hopes up.
Her brother sat next to her.
"How was Forest?" she asked.
"She's getting even better. Not everything she does is on accident anymore." He laughed. He could see his sister was evidently down, the missing headphones was his first tip, his second was that she hadn't seen Forest in at least a week. "Why don't you come next time?" Scorpius asked "You haven't seen her in at least a week."
Zeph shook her head "She's visiting this weekend, besides you know I can't stay up on a broom." Her brother didn't argue it. He was sitting quietly, when he noticed the letter in Zeph's hand.. "Who's it from?"
"What?" Zeph asked. She was drifting off into thought, into just, she didn't even know.
"The letter." Scorpius clarified.
"Oh, Calix, Calix Lovegood." She answered quietly. He nodded.
"He's a nice guy." Scorpius lied. He didn't want to make her feel any worse than she felt. "What's it about?"
"He just wanted to go to Diagon Alley next week."
"And?" Scorpius pushed. While he didn't find Calix to be the best guy, he wasn't the worst, and he was tired of his sister sitting in her room, blasting music the entire night.
"And what?" she retorted, staring into the sky.
"Are you going to go?" he asked.
She shrugged "I don't know."
"You should." His sister looked at him curiously. "Because you know, why not?" She stared into the sky.
Why not?