Big, big thanks to everyone who reviewed. Time skip again; this is the last day of exams.

25th June 2023

"I'm just, you know, staying away. Until we've both slept and relaxed and won't rip each other to pieces." Scorpius knew he was perfectly justified in avoiding his girlfriend, but it was difficult to explain properly when Albus was looking at him like that. The problem, he supposed, when your best friend was your girlfriend's brother.

"Exams are now officially over. She finished her last one an hour ago. Don't you think you should go ask her how it went?" Al asked pointedly.

"No. No, I absolutely do not. I asked on Wednesday how her Charms exam went, and she bit my head off." Scorpius replied, his voice edging towards defensive.

"And she asked if you were alright Tuesday morning and you bit her head off." Al pointed out. "You're both as bad as each other. I guess we should have all figured out it'd be like this, since you're both irritable people." They were in the room of requirement, Scorpius sat on a sofa, Albus on a chair. Initially, Rose and Ally had been with them, too, but had left minutes before.

"I am not -!" Scorpius stopped, breathed once, and lowered his voice. "I am not an irritable person. I was simply a little stressed out – justified, I think, in the circumstances – and, yeah, probably a little over sensitive. She is the irritable one."

"She had her O. W. Ls, Scorpius. She was stressed out, too." Peacemaker was not a role Albus felt suited to. And having his loyalties tested this way wasn't something he was comfortable with.

"Yeah, I noticed. I also noticed her blaming me for being unprepared. You were there, you saw that one, remember? She told me to get away from her, that it was my fault she wasn't ready anyway, and if I hadn't taken up so much of her time, she'd have done more revision. How is that fair?"

"I remember." Albus said wearily. He hated watching his best friend and little sister argue, hated having them both complain to him about the other, and hated having to try to avoid taking sides. "And yeah, OK, maybe she was a little wrong to throw it all on you -"

"A little?"

"But she was sort of right, Scorpius. You were both spending a lot of time together. How many times were you having to do homework at breakfast, because you'd been busy with Lily the night before?" He refused, point-blank refused, to wonder what they were so busy doing. "How many times was she doing the same? And I was there a few weeks ago, when she said she had to go revise and you convinced her to stay with you for another hour."

Scorpius folded his arms, looked annoyed. "That was ages ago. She had loads of time left, and it's not like I forced her to stay, is it?"

"You didn't give her much choice, though, holding onto her and nagging." Al sighed. He wasn't going to talk about that particular moment anymore. It hadn't been exactly comfortable for him to watch. "Look, I'm not taking sides, OK?" He was careful not to take sides, even though they both knew that if it came down to it, and Albus absolutely had to chose, he would side with Lily. He wouldn't like doing it, and he'd avoid it for as long as possible, but that's where he'd be, in the end. "I'm just saying, I can see it from both your points of view. You've argued a lot lately, and you're both at fault. And with the exams, both of your exams, it's understandable, however annoying."

Scorpius glared a little, then looked uncomfortable. "It's just, I'm not sure what we're going to do, Al. In a few days, I'm done here. Come September, she'll be back, I won't, and I don't know if we're going to stay together or not. I guess I just wanted to, ah, spend time together while we could." His face went faintly pink. "And now I don't want to keep arguing with her."

Al rubbed a hand over his face. He was shattered, and there was a nagging dread in his stomach, that he knew wouldn't go away till he got his exam results. His N. E. W. Ts were a big deal, after all. He wanted to collapse face down on his bed and not move for several hours. "Look, you guys need to talk about this. Rose told me the other day that Lily's worrying about the exact same thing, so maybe that's part of the reason you haven't been getting along lately." When Scorpius started to speak, Al cut him off. "No. No, no, no, no, no. I refuse, OK? I will not sit here any longer and listen to you moan about her, I will not dissect every argument or look with you, and I will not discuss your relationship problems anymore. You go talk to Lily, work things out with her, right now. And since I lost a lot of sleep this past few days, I am going to bed."

With that, Al stood, and left the room.

Scorpius groaned, threw himself sideways so that he laid, curled, on the sofa rather than sat on it, and pressed his face into a pillow.

------------

"Aw, come on, Lily." There were faint purple smudges under Lydia's eyes. They contrasted harshly with her pale skin – paler than usual due to the lack of sleep – and made Lily anxious.

"No. Lydie, you should sleep. You look awful." It was genuine concern in Lily's voice, Lydia knew, and not just a way of changing the subject. Because of that, Lydia slipped her arm around Lily's waist as they walked slowly down the corridor.

"I'm fine. Really. You know how I get about exams." Lydia placated. Lily nodded, because she'd seen it year after year. Lydia showed no signs of stress, simply revised the best she could and maintained that whatever would happen would happen. And then she'd lay awake, night after night, not worrying, but unable to sleep for more than a couple of hours, regardless. It was something that baffled, annoyed and sometimes amused Lydia. "Don't worry about me." Lydia told her, knowing she would anyway. They'd been friends for Lydia's entire lifetime, after all, were closer than sisters, and fiercely protective of each other.

"I know, I know. But exams're over now, you'll be able to sleep." Lily replied. While Lydia was nowhere near as delicate as her appearance suggested, Lily disliked seeing her this way.

"Yeah. Later. When I've fixed you and Scorpius."

"We don't need fixing. We're fine." Lily said, her voice cooler now. "Please, Lyd, just leave it. I don't much want to talk to him right now."

Lydia hesitated, then nodded. "OK. OK, I'll leave it. If you promise me you'll talk to him tomorrow. In fact, you promise you'll have talked to him by this time tomorrow."

"I promise I'll have talked to him by this time tomorrow, if you go to bed, right now." Lily replied evenly.

Lydia laughed. "Deal done. You should sleep too, you know."

"Yeah, think I will. Now, march."

Lydia laughed again, then hugged Lily tightly. "Thanks for worrying about me."

"Right back at you." Lily murmured. Letting Lydia go, she studied her for a moment. "Any deals we can make that'll make you put on weight?"

"If only." Lydia replied, rolling her eyes. It was an old joke, as Lydia's build never altered, no matter how much she ate. "I'll catch you later."

Lily nodded, watched Lydia walked down the corridor, before turning and wondering away herself. She didn't want to sleep; wasn't particularly tired. She hadn't lost much sleep, really, never one to lay awake worrying, however nervous she was. It was too early to go eat. And, after so many weeks of nothing but revision, the spare time seemed odd. After some deliberation, she headed for the Room of Requirement, figuring she'd find something to do.

She'd already stepped inside and closed the door before she saw him; he sat up quickly, ran a hand through his hair, and looked at her. For a moment, she stood, silent and awkward. They hadn't, recently, been able to stay in the same room with bickering, or arguing, and she didn't have the energy for another round. "I, ah, didn't realise anyone was in here." She said finally, and started to turn back to the door.

"Wait. Stay, Lily, we should talk."

"Scorpius, I really don't want to talk to you right now, OK? And unless you want to start screaming at each other again, you'll leave me alone."

"So this is it, huh? We're going to avoid each other for the next couple of days? The last couple of days?" He didn't want that. As much as he'd been planning to avoid her today, he realised he wanted them back to normal, for the last days they had.

"No. No, I promised Lydia I'd talk to you tomorrow. So we'll talk tomorrow."

He stood. "No. We'll talk now. I don't want to be avoiding you, I don't want to argue. In fact, I promise, if we start arguing, I'll leave the room. We need to talk, Lily."

She hesitated, then nodded. "OK. OK, sure. First one to start shouting has to walk." She crossed the room as he sat back down, and she sat on the other end of the sofa, curled up and facing him.

He took a moment to look at her. They wouldn't talk about how they felt about each other, not yet. They'd had a brief, awkward conversation after the Easter holidays, decided not to worry about it so much, and see how things went. So they wouldn't talk about how they felt. And, because she was only sixteen, he wouldn't tell her he loved her.

It wasn't easy keeping it to himself, of course. He'd realised it at the party, when the idea of breaking up had cut at him. When, even as he'd told her that if she didn't walk back into the ballroom, they were done, he'd known that he'd do anything to keep her around. And even after the last couple of weeks of constant arguing, he knew he still loved her. And thought he might always love her, too.

But she wasn't ready to hear it, and too young to love him back. So he'd keep it to himself, for now.

"I saw Lydia yesterday. She didn't look so great." He said finally.

"No, I know. Exams don't agree with her. I sent her to bed; she'll sleep right through till tomorrow morning, and then eat enough breakfast for three people. She'll be fine."

"But you worry anyway." He murmured. Lily half-smiled.

"Of course I worry. She's...my Lydie. I'm going to check on her later - I'll get Lorcan or Zander to let me in – and then in the morning, if she still looks bad, I'll force her up to the hospital wing. She'd do the same for me." Lily shrugged. "But you don't want to talk about Lydia, do you?"

"I wanted to know she'd be OK." He told her truthfully. He had, through spending time with Lily, spent a lot of time with Lydia, too. And it was hard not to develop a sisterly affection towards her. "But we need to talk about something else. I'm leaving Hogwarts, Lily."

"I know. Two days, and then you're finished here." Hadn't she been worrying about it? Hadn't it been in the back of her mind for ages now?

"We should talk about – about after. What we're going to do after."

She toyed with her hair. "I understand. If you want to, you know, um, finish it. I won't pretend it won't bother me, because we both know it will. But if you want to go out there, concentrate on other things, and not have a girlfriend who's still in school, who you'll only get to see in holidays, then I get it." Even if she wasn't sure how she'd adjust to that.

He nodded. "And I understand if you'd rather end it, not have a boyfriend you only see in holidays. I'd get it if you'd rather see guys in your own year." Even if the idea of her with someone else stabbed at him.

They looked at each other for a long moment. "I don't want to go out there, concentrate on other things, and not have a girlfriend who's still in school, who I'll only see in holidays." He said finally. "I like my girlfriend. Doesn't matter how little I see her, I think we could make it work."

She smiled, amused. "And I wouldn't rather see guys in my own year. Apparently I like my boyfriend enough to only see him in the holidays." She paused. "So we...we're not going to break up."

"I don't want to. As long as you don't..."

"I don't. Even if you have spent the last fortnight irritating me."

"Me?"

"Yes, you. There were times I'd have happily killed you." Before he could reply, she continued. "Are we really going to do this? Do you think we can actually make it work? Only seeing each other in the holidays?"

"Yeah. I think we can. And I could come up here on Hogsmeade weekends. And we can write a lot. I don't want to break up, Lily."

She looked away, slightly uncomfortable. A part of her knew what he meant by that, what it was in his eyes. A part of her returned it. But she refused to think about it.

"OK. Good."

They talked about other things for an hour or so, then something occurred to her. "We've been together, what, nearly seven months now?"

"Yeah. Little under, I think."

She nodded. "Um, second week of the holidays, the whole family's getting together at the Burrow. My grandparents' place, I mean. Ah...Grandma keeps telling me she wants to meet you, and, well..."

"A family deal? Are you serious? Lily, I can't go to one of your family things."

"Why? I went along to yours, if you remember. And you know most of them, anyway. And...I'd like you to be there." To see what the family thought of him, to see what he thought of them.

"Lily..."

"Come on, just for a little while. They won't hurt you."

"I'm not scared of them, I just -"

"Aw, come on, don't be a baby. Just for a few hours. Free food."

He squirmed for a moment, then sighed. "OK, sure. Why the hell not?"