Chapter twenty – O.W.L.s
We rushed onto the platform that was already filled with weeping families hugging their children and talking to friends. We were almost late, the train would be leaving any minute, and so I hurriedly hugged James and my parents.
"We'll see you in a few weeks."
"Yep bye!" throwing a wave over my shoulder I ran off towards the train leaving them saying goodbye to Al. I burst onto the train and shoved my way through the crowds looking for the right carriage; finally I saw Scorpius waiting for me by an open compartment and ran over to him throwing myself into his hug. We hadn't seen each other for days and I was so absorbed by his embrace that I almost didn't notice Emma and Hugo sitting down beside Lucy Carmichael from our Charms class.
"Oops sorry, hi." I peeled myself off Scorpius and we sat down with the others.
"Where's Al?" Emma asked trying to sound casual.
"He's just escaping mum's suffocating hugs." I told her with a little laugh.
"Hi Lucy, did you enjoy the holiday?" I asked politely.
"Oh, yes I did thanks it was nice to have a break from all the exam pressure." I could tell she was nervous sitting with us.
"Tell me about it, I was about ready to beat Mr Higgs up with my textbook because he just wouldn't shut up about revising." Al had joined us and was deep in conversation with Scorpius.
"You guys are lucky, try having a father who is a teacher. Then there's no escaping the pressure." Emma grumbled sadly.
"At least next year will be exam-free." Lucy pointed out.
"Speak for yourselves." Scorpius interjected from beside me, next year would be his seventh and with that came the all important N.E.W.T.s.
"Aw you poor thing." I said sarcastically, we all giggled and I kissed his cheek comfortingly.
"Wait are you two…you know a couple?" Apparently Lucy hadn't heard the gossip before the holiday.
"We are." Scorpius smiled at me proudly.
"Blimey Lucy didn't you hear the gossip?" Al seemed as shocked as the rest of us that she hadn't.
"No, I hardly pay any attention to any of that stuff."
"Oh she's wise I like her." Al winked at Hugo who flushed pink.
"So, did any noses get broken at the Malfoy dinner?" Hugo asked trying to divert the attention off himself.
"Who had a broken nose?" Lucy asked looking around at us all individually as if checking for any signs.
"Don't ask." I mumbled guiltily provoking a giggle off Emma.
"Don't get on Lily's bad side, she's got a mean right hook." Al joked winking at me when I scowled.
"Oh shut up."
"I think I'll take her advice and just not ask." Lucy decided and I smiled at her.
"Another wise choice."
"Right might as well get changed into our robes, come on." Al nodded at Scorpius and Hugo to accompany him to another carriage to change.
"Don't be gone long." I said to Scorpius quietly as he gave me a parting hug, it was slightly pathetic that even when he was away from me for a few minutes I felt an aching within my chest.
With the boys gone we started unpacking our robes and uniforms, it was oddly silent and I tried to ignore the discomfort it roused.
"So I was thinking, maybe we should all study together in like a study group sort of thing, what do you think?" I was grateful for Emma breaking the silence.
"That'd be great! I'll be less likely to die of boredom if we do it together." I agreed enthusiastically, I never studied well if I was left alone so this could be perfect.
"Would you like to join us too Lucy?" I realised she hadn't thought the invite extended to her and looked quite startled by the offer.
"Are you sure?" she asked uncertainly.
"Absolutely." I didn't know Lucy that well; she sat by us in Charms and was always quiet but very polite.
"We need another girl in the group anyway." Emma stated matter-of-factly.
"Yeah since Rose got made a prefect she hasn't been around much so we've been outnumbered." I was a little annoyed at Rose for suddenly deserting her friends and family to hang around with the other prefects but really it didn't matter much, she never really enjoyed our idle chatter or jokes because she was a lot more mature than us and preferred to focus on her work.
"Oh well thank you, I don't really have that many friends in Ravenclaw." She looked quite embarrassed admitting this and we all sat down again now that we were done changing.
"Why not?" I silently cursed Emma's curiosity for probing further into the subject when Lucy clearly wasn't keen on talking about it.
"They all have their little groups and I just never really felt like I fit in." her brown eyes strayed to the floor timidly and I scowled at Emma for being tactless.
"Well you'll fit in with us." She told her trying to mend the situation. It worked; Lucy looked up with a hopeful expression and a small smile.
"Thanks." the train started to draw nearer to the castle which was now in view and the boys rejoined us fully dressed in their robes ready for our last term of school.
The revision classes went better than we expected, not only did they help our exam preparation but they gave us all a chance to sit together and talk. Scorpius, Al and Hugo had been busy with Quidditch practice in preparation for the final match of the year when Slytherin went against Gryffindor and so we hadn't seen them much because of our packed lesson schedule.
"No, see you've missed Equuleus." Scorpius pointed to a section of my diagram.
"Oh bugger." I started drawing in the constellation I'd missed out.
"Delphinus is too close to Aquila too." He added indicating another area on my drawing.
"Oh I give up." I tossed down my quill and sighed.
"You're doing better than I am Lily, I can't even remember the names of them all." Hugo said trying to lift my spirits but it was no use. We'd all be crowded around the table in the library for hours now and we were still no closer to being finished than we had when we arrived.
"Where is Centaurus again?" Lucy asked squinting angrily at her messy parchment.
"Above Crux." Al told her as he strained across the table to see her work.
"Lets just face it, we all suck at Astronomy." Emma grumbled, she slumped on the desk and buried her face in her arms.
"Maybe we should take a break and try a different subject." Scorpius suggested gathering up the Astronomy textbooks littering the desk.
"Yes, let's have a crack at Herbology instead." Al agreed cheerfully, I was increasingly grateful for their help with our revision because they didn't have the exams and surely had better things they could be doing but they continually sat with us going over content they'd already studied.
"Why don't we just leave it there for tonight and have a rest, it might seem easier after some sleep." I suggested hoping to get a break and I was relieved when they all seemed pleased by the idea.
"Sounds good, we've done a lot today." We all packed up our things and headed back to the Gryffindor common room, Lucy and Scorpius were regular visitors there so nobody paid any attention now.
We all collapsed onto the comfy seating in front of the warm fire glad to be able to relax again, Scorpius pulled me onto his lap and we snuggled up on one of the armchairs together.
"I can't believe it's almost the end of another year." Emma commented sadly.
"I know we'll be sixth years when we come back." Hugo seemed to like the idea of being older.
"It's our last year then Scor." Al winked at Scorpius and I realised I only had another year left with him, after that I'd have to spend a year here without him – we'd be separated for months. I knew he'd seen the look of horror on my face and was thinking the same thing because he pulled me closer against him like he never wanted to let go.
"Oh and Professor McGonagall is retiring." Emma announced shocking us all.
"What?" I gasped hardly believing what I'd heard.
"Dad told me in the holidays, she's going to stand down after this year finishes." Her father being a teacher was incredibly handy for gossip sometimes.
"But who's going to be headmaster then?" Hugo asked looking just as disbelieving.
"Or headmistress." Lucy pointed out, after all our current head of school was female and so her replacement could easily be.
"Dad doesn't know yet but he thinks it might be Professor Sprout, she's been here as long as McGonagall and they were close friends." I couldn't imagine our short cheerful Herbology teacher being headmistress.
"I didn't see this coming." I admitted still reeling from the news.
"She asked your dad to take over." Emma added casually.
"What?" Al and I said in unison, both staring at her with our eyes and mouth wide from shock.
"Didn't he say anything?" she seemed confused that we didn't already know.
"No." we both replied again exchanging a glance.
"Yes well you know she was always fond of your dad and even though he's not a Hogwarts teacher she thought he'd do a great job running the school."
"What did he say?" Al urged.
"I don't know exactly but according to my dad he's happy at the Ministry." Everyone fell silent as we absorbed all the new information, I could hardly believe my dad would turn down the opportunity to be headmaster of Hogwarts it just didn't make sense.
"I'm going to go for a run." I told them standing up abruptly.
"Would you like some company?" Scorpius offered.
"No thanks, I just want to be alone for a bit."
"Don't be gone long Lily, it looks like it might rain." I ignored Emma's warning and hurried out the portrait hole needing to clear my head.
I lost count of how many laps around the castle I made but Emma had been right and it'd started to rain. I ignored the brisk wind and the water pouring down soaking me. I ignored the fact that it was dark and that people would be waiting for me. I ignored the pain in my chest and the aching in my legs. I just pushed myself harder, forced my body to keep moving and tried desperately to keep my mind blank because if I let myself think then I had to come to terms with the fact that I was going to have to spend a year without Scorpius. Finally I stopped, I knew that if I kept going I would only wear myself out too much. My legs and arms were numb and I didn't realise how wet I was until I saw the puddles of water I left behind with every step.
"Bugger, Emma is going to kill me." I muttered to myself as I headed up the dormitory stairs.
"Yes she is." I screamed and spun around to see Emma standing behind me, hands on hips looking extremely annoyed.
"Bloody hell Emma you almost gave me a heart attack!" I gently patted my chest where my heart was hammering frantically.
"Good because I've been worried sick for hours!" she was definitely mad.
"I'm sorry; I needed to clear my head and just lost track of the time."
"Oh well I'm glad you didn't notice how long you were gone, I had to lie to Scorpius because he was talking about going after you."
"What?"
"He thought something had happened to you, I had to tell him you were taking a bath because of the rain." I immediately felt guilty for worrying both her and Scorpius.
"Emma I'm sorry." I pleaded desperately.
"Ugh." She sighed heavily. "Come on, you're soaking we need to dry you off." I smiled gratefully and led her drag me up to the dorm.
I accidentally sneezed violently into my goblet and splashed Emma and Lucy with pumpkin juice; they both shrieked and leapt up out of their seats.
"God Lily…"
"Gross it's in my hair…" they miserably wiped the juice off and scowled at me.
"I'm sorry…" I paused to sniff back my runny nose. "It's this cold I've got, I can't control it."
"Well you wouldn't have a cold if you didn't go running in the pouring rain."
"Gee thanks Em, I hadn't realised that." I muttered sarcastically wiping my nose with the back of my hand.
"Realised what?" I spun around and came face to face with Scorpius; he grinned at me brightly and gently took my hand.
"I wouldn't touch her if I was you." Emma warned with another scowl directed at me.
"Why not?" he asked clearly confused.
"She's diseased." Lucy joked.
"I have a cold." I told him flatly trying to stifle a cough.
"Aw sweetheart." He took my face between his hands and his thumbs gently massaged my cheeks.
"Can you guys hold off on the lovey-dovey stuff until after I've eaten please?" I hadn't seen Al and Hugo join us. Obediently Scorpius withdrew his hands and we sat back down.
"Where did you come from?" he couldn't answer right away because of the huge wad of toast he'd crammed into his mouth.
"I just climbed out of a hole in the ground." He told me sarcastically with his mouth still full.
"Oh ha, ha, you're hilarious Al."
"Well where do you think I came from genius." I scowled at him and he laughed.
"So are you ill or is the red nose and puffy eyes a new look for you?"
"I have a cold."
"Why?"
"She went running in the rain for hours." Emma informed them, shooting me another sharp glare.
"Ugh stay away from me sis I don't want to catch anything with the Quidditch match coming."
"A cold wouldn't stop you playing." I pointed out with another cough.
"If I sneeze at the wrong time I could miss a shot." I rolled my eyes at his overdramatic tone.
"Fine I'll stay away from you all in case I'm contagious." I wasn't in the best mood having spent the morning listening to Emma tell me it was my own fault I was ill. I stood up to leave but Scorpius caught my wrist and pulled me onto his lap.
"I don't care if I catch something." He kissed me softly and the gentle movement of his lips soothed my bad mood and had my head spinning.
"You know my nose feels clearer." I told him when we broke apart, he cocked and eyebrow and grinned at me.
"Is that so?"
"Yes, you should do it again. Maybe you can cure me." he laughed softly and then drew me back to him kissing me again.
"You two are sickening, do you know that?" we both glared at my bitter brother.
"You're just jealous because I have a beautiful girlfriend and you don't." my heart fluttered at his words and I nuzzled his neck gratefully.
"Oh please, I have better taste than the likes of my sister." Al scoffed receiving an evil look from me and a slap on the back of the head from Scorpius.
"Do you two ever manage a conversation without having a dig at each other?" Emma asked sceptically.
"She knows I'm only kidding." Al smiled at me knowing he was right. My relationship with Al was less affectionate than the one I shared with James, we joked around a lot more but we loved each other just as much.
"So this is our last weekend before the exams." Hugo reminded us bringing the atmosphere crashing down.
"Yep, one last chance to revise." Lucy agreed, smiling much wider at him than she should do. I rolled my eyes and wondered to myself when my friends were going to stop ignoring their feelings, first I'd had to put up with practically a year of Emma and Al refusing to admit they liked each other and now it was happening with Hugo and Lucy too.
The two weeks of exams passed in a blur, every second I wasn't in an exam was spent revising for the next one or sleeping because I sat up some nights reviewing notes. Scorpius and Al kept up their revision assistance and helped keep us all calm by explaining how each exam would work.
My last exam was History of Magic and I had very little confidence in my ability to pass it, I very rarely remembered anything from the lessons and my notes had just been crammed full of so many dates, names and events that it was impossible to memorize them.
Somehow I got through it and oddly some of it made sense, with the exams finally over I ran from the hall vaguely aware of Emma following straight up the stairs to the common room where Al and Scorpius sat talking. They glanced up and saw the two of us enter, Scorpius seemed startled to see me sprinting towards him, he stood up and no doubt braced himself for the impact he knew was coming as I hurled myself into his arms.
"I'm glad that's finally over with." I sighed against his soft white hair.
"I bet you did great." He replied reassuringly as we sat back onto a sofa near Al and Emma who were deep in conversation.
"I guess we'll see when the results come through." I couldn't fight the nagging feeling that I hadn't done as well as I'd hoped.
"Don't look so worried, you're supposed to be relaxing." He gently rubbed my arm trying to soothe me.
"Yeah you're right." I sighed letting the tension release from my body and leant gently against Scorpius as he draped his arm around my shoulders. We sat there for an immeasurable length of time, just enjoying being able to spend time together free from all the talk of lessons as Emma and Al talked enthusiastically.