In retrospect, I probably should have put a bit more of a concerted effort into getting rid of the slightly loopy hormonal grin. Although the kiss was well worth it. The formalities had barely been dispensed with – 'Hullo Narcissa' (from both of us – she insisted that gran made her feel old. She was only 55, after all.) 'Hello Paivi. Hello Scorpius. Come in. Good heavens you've grown!' etc – when she turned back to look at me, scrutinised my face in incredible detail, smirked slightly, and then said "Who's the girl?"

In a fit of idiocy, I begged ignorance. "What girl?"

Mum closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose. Narcissa laughed. "That's exactly what your father said when he came home after first meeting your mother. Of course he was older, but he still had the somewhat far off loopy grin you had a moment ago. And darling, the fact that you went slightly pale when I asked somewhat belied your supposed ignorance. So. Who is she."

We sat down in the living room and one of the house elves appeared with tea. "Come on, Scorpius. I get precious little amusement from young love these days." She said as she poured tea.

"Well," I began, "she's in my house – she was the other Slytherin prefect this year. We're on the quiddich team together—" I was at that point cut off by Narcissa.

"What's her name."

Oh yes. I'd forgotten about that. "Rose Weasley."

"You don't seem especially heartbroken to be separated from her for the next three months." Came Narcissa's somewhat calculating remark.

At this, mum laughed. "He'll get to that. Right now he's just riding on a high from their rather…passionate farewell."

Narcissa raised an eyebrow. "That explains a lot. Just how passionate was their farewell?"

Something told me that my services were no longer needed for this topic of conversation.

"That they knew what they were doing was evident." Was my mother's response. I looked at her in horror. "It was." The horrified look remained in place. "There are some things you don't ever want to hear your mum say. Your belief that we 'knew what we were doing' was definitely one of them."

"For heaven's sake Scorpius. If you can't take the heat, don't play with the dragons."

I stayed quiet.

"As I was saying," mum continued, "They were suitably…you know…that her father looked apoplectic."

They both chuckled.

"She's a rather pretty girl." Mum continued. I stared blankly into the middle distance. It was like a train wreck: I couldn't look, but I just couldn't look away. "A good chunk shorter than him, but he's six foot four, what would you expect. Bright red hair, badly bruised. Why was that, Scorpius?"

"Quiddich accident." I said. Narcissa indicated me to keep going. "We were five hours into the final, and she got hit three times by the same bludger. And she managed to stay on her broom through the first two hits. She only fell off after the third because she was unconscious."

"Well, she's got spunk." Said Narcissa, turning again to my mother, giving me the impression that I was no longer necessary for the purposes of the conversation for the time being. It was somewhat unnerving being discussed in the third person.

And INTERLUDE!!!!!!!!!

Oh good god. Laura and Moona had followed Elin's example, dying their hair black and growing numerous piercings.

"Scorpius!" They said in a rather disconcerting unison before each hugging me in turn.

"Hej hej." I responded. Mum and I had arrived in Oulainen, and were being enthusiastically greeted. Mum by Melissa, her sister, I by my cousins.

"Do you have jet lag?" asked Laura in Finnish.

"We apparated. My brain still thinks it's in Britain."

"Good. Elin has her driving license. Let's go to the beach. You have a lot of talking to do."

That didn't bode well. On the surface, it was a completely innocuous proposal. The problem was that the nearest beach was in Kalajoki, an hour's drive away. Clearly mum had been talking to Melissa on the phone. Laura was incredibly skilled at listening in on conversations.

We were in Elin's car, pulling out of the driveway when Moona started the interrogation.

"Who's your girlfriend?"

"A girl from school."

"You think? What's her name? Age? What does she look like? What does she do in her free time? What music does she listen to? This is us finally being able to make you really uncomfortable: you don't have a sister to do it for you."

"Thanks. I replied acidly. Her name is Rose, she's fifteen, red hair, blue eyes, freckles, relatively short. She plays quiddich and listens to metal."

Elin shrugged from the driver's seat. It seemed that she approved.

"It's about time." Said Laura. I looked at her, somewhat confused. "You really think we didn't notice that you spent half your time here last summer emailing some girl?"

So that was why they had spent a lot of time looking at me, exchanging significant glances and then cracking up last summer. It had become a touch weird.

"How did you know I was emailing a girl?"

"You didn't delete the browser history."

Oh. Oops.

And another interlude!!! I really need to focus harder on not just jumping to the bits in which stuff happens.

Dad had just returned from Uganda, which was once again in the grip of a particularly nasty military dictatorship. I didn't know what it was exactly that my dad did for the UN, but it tended to involve going places where a the political turmoil had gotten somewhat out of hand.

I had been wondering why it was that Rose's father had seemed about to burst a vein in his forehead when he had seen us kissing. Even factoring in the excessive over-protectiveness Rose would occasionally complain about, that was a slightly unexpected reaction.

"Dad, I got the vibe that Rose's father thinks I'm the spawn of Satan. Why?"

He sighed and then responded. "There are in all likelihood three reasons. To start with, you were engaged in a rather… inappropriate farewell with his daughter. Then there's the fact that you're in Slytherin. I sometimes work with one of Rose's aunts, and apparently Ron still has issues with the fact that his daughter is in Slytherin. He probably took it as a personal affront that not only was she sorted into Slytherin, but she's dating one as well. and then there's the fact that I'm your father. Rose's father and I … didn't get along at school. We completely hated each other, to be entirely truthful. The time we grew up in was a pretty dark age, our prospective families thoroughly disliked each other and we had been raised to more or less hate each other. He's probably less than thrilled that his daughter likes you."

Well. That explained a lot. "Why are you so ambivalent towards him then?"

"Ask my mother about Bella." He looked somewhat uncomfortable so I dropped the subject.

Later on, as I was emailing Rose, I decided to see what magigoogle had to say about 'Bella'. I came up with nothing. Just a few links regarding a teen romance involving vampires and werewolves. Probably not what he meant. I asked Rose. Her answer the next day had been that she'd asked her mum, who had claimed ignorance, but had gone pale and was no doubt lying. Curious.