Chapter 25- Pressure

Disclaimer: Don't Own.

AN: Hey everyone, I know it's been a while but it's midterm/essay season and it's just a crazy time of the year. Anyways thanks to all of you have have stuck with me so far. I think I'm expecting about 10 more chapters in the story, maybe 15, we'll see how many it takes me to wrap this up. Anyways on to the chapter now. Please Read and Review! I love your feedback :D

-SM

Rose walked down the corridor of the Hogwarts express looking for the compartment that held her best friends. She had just completed her prefect rounds and she couldn't wait to catch up with her friends. She had seen Scorpius breiefly at the prefects meeting, but had been paired with one of the Slytherin prefects for rounds.

"Charlotte!" Rose exclaimed as she burst into the compartment where Charlotte was sitting with Al and Scorpius. Rose enveloped the dark haired girl it a forceful hug. She had spent some time at Charlotte's house in Muggle London at the very beginning of the summer, but they hadn't seen each other since. Rose had been at Malfoy Manor when Charlotte had visited Al at the end of the summer.

"Hey Ro, how are you?" Charlotte asked returning the red-heads enthusiastic embrace.

"Marvelous. I can't wait to get back to Hogwarts." Rose said excitedly as she plopped down onto the seat beside Scorpius, throwing her arm across his shoulders and giving him a side hug, which he returned.

"It's going to be such a busy year." He said. "Especially with you being Quidditch Captain."

"Yeah…"

"Come on Rosie, we've been over this. You're going to be a great captain." Scorpius told her for the hundredth time since she got the badge.

"I still think that you would have been a better choice."

"Nonsense Rosie, we both know that Jenkins made the right choice." Scorpius gave her a reassuring smile before pulling her into another side hug.

"Congratulations Ro! This is going to be an interesting year with the pair of you as Captains." Charlotte said gesturing between the two cousins. "Now, what NEWTS are you lot taking?" She elbowed Al in the side when he mumbled something about Ravenclaws under his breath.

"Ow, Charlotte that bloody hurt!" She smiled innocently at her boyfriend, who scowled.

"Transfiguration, Defense, Potions, Charms, History of Magic, Astronomy, Ancient Runes, Arithmancy, Care of Magical Creatures and Herbology." Rose listed off.

"That's a lot Rose." Al told his cousin. "I'm dropping Divination, Muggle Studies, and Care of Magical Creatures."

"It's nothing that I can't handle." Rose said. "Besides, Scop's taking ten NEWTS too."

"I'm dropping Divination too. It's complete rubbish, I'm also dropping Muggle Studies, I mean I'm Muggle born, it's kind of redundant." Charlotte said.

"You Ravenclaws are too smart for your own bloody good." Al said, earning another shove in the ribs from his girlfriend. "Ow!" The other three laughed as Al scowled mumbling something about needing to spend more time with his own house.

The rest of the ride to Hogsmeade station was spent sharing stories about their summer, plans for the year and in Al's case finishing up the last of his summer work before they returned to Hogwarts. Al and Rose's brother Hugo already had plans of becoming the school's newest Potter-Weasley Prankster team since Fred and James had graduated. Before long the train came to a halt and Hagrid was calling out to the first years to follow him while the rest of the students boarded the carriages and began their journey to the castle. The Headmistress gave the usual welcoming speech and the first years were sorted, Gryffindor gaining the most new students with Slytherin as a close second. Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff had gained a fair number as well.

"Charlotte, I think that you should consider trying out for the Quidditch team this year." Rose said as she sat at the Ravenclaw table with Scorpius and Charlotte.

"Ro, I've barely ever played. I'm not very good…" The raven haired girl stated.

"Are you mental? You may not have as much experience as others but Char, you're one of the best Chasers I've ever seen. You fly circles around my cousins who have been playing since they were old enough to ride a broom stick. Think about it Char."

"We'll see."

"Remind me why am I taking ten NEWTS again?" Scorpius said flopping down beside Charlotte and Al on the sofa by the fire in the Ravenclaw common room. "How does she do it?" Al and Charlotte laughed.

"She's the daughter of Hermione Granger, she's always thrived under pressure. My father may have been the Chosen One, but Rosie's always had so much expected of her." Scorpius gave the green eyed boy a look. "Everyone expects her to be brilliant and funny, super organized, good at everything she does, a know it all, great at Quidditch, pretty much she's expected to be perfect. You know the only reason she even plays Quidditch is because of her father? I mean she enjoys it now, but flying used to terrify her. She only started playing because of Uncle Ron. You know the first time she ever went against her father's wishes was when she befriended you, my father said that he thought Uncle Ron was going to have an aneurysm when he found out." Scorpius blinked, the last bit he had already been quite aware of, remembering the howler Rose had received when her father had found out that he was her friend.

"But she's always seemed to love Quidditch so much. The first conversation I ever had with her was about Quidditch on the train in first year. She's always been good at everything." He said, still shocked from what Al had told him.

"That's Rosie for you. Never met a challenge she couldn't overcome… well sort of." Scorpius cocked his eyebrow at Albus, but didn't question farther knowing that Al wasn't going to elaborate on that point.

"What are you doing here anyways Potter. People are going to start forgetting that you're in Gryffindor with the amount of time you spend here." Al glared at the blonde. "Where is Rosie anyways?"

"Re-writing her tryout schedule for the hundredth time. She wants everything to be perfect for tomorrow." Charlotte told the boys.

"Are you trying out Char?" Scorpius asked.

"What?" Al looked between the two Ravenclaws, a confused expression on his face.

"Rosie asked Charlotte to tryout for the team." Scorpius said simply.

"I don't know. I mean I'm really not very good."

"Char you have to!" Al exclaimed energetically. "You know that Rosie wouldn't have suggested it if she didn't think that you could do it." Al said.

"I don't know you guys…" Charlotte said before turning towards Scorpius with a wicked grin on her face. "So, what are you going to do about- Hi Rose"

"Hey guys," Rose looked at them suspiciously, "What are you lot on about?" Rose said coming up behind the group.

"Oh, uh, not much. Charlotte here was just telling Malfoy and I about how she was going to try out for Quidditch tomorrow." Al told his cousin.

"That's wonderful Charlotte, you're going to be absolutely brilliant, I just know it." Rose exclaimed, her face lighting up with excitement.

"That's not exactly-" Charlotte looked up at the excited expression on the red-heads face and caved. "Oh alright."

Rose walked onto the pitch at 10:30 the next morning. She looked out over the faces of the candidates. She had a long day ahead of her due to the many open positions she had to fill since along with herself, only Scorpius and White would be returning to the team. She needed two beaters, a keeper and another chaser to fill the team. She decided that she would try out the Chasers first since there were only four hopefuls, including Charlotte.

Rose took her perspective chasers up into the air and began running drills with them. All four were quite talented, but Charlotte came out on top in the shoot outs and Rose couldn't be more proud of her friend. It took more then four grueling hours of tryouts before Rose had her team. Charlotte filled in the third Chaser position, the two beater positions were filled by David Spooner and Ross Logan both in seventh year and their keeper position was filled by fellow sixth year Dominic Bailey.

"For someone who doesn't think they'd make a good captain, you're sure doing a great job so far." Scorpius told her causing her to look up at him where he was leaning against the lockers. " I told you you'd be brilliant."

Rose smiled weakly as he came and sat beside her on the bench. "I don't know Scorp, that was just tryouts. I don't know if I can do it."

"Sure you can Rosie, you can do anything you put your mind to." He slung an arm over her shoulders, pulling her to him. "Plus, I'm always here if you need some help." He smiled at her widely and she let her head fall onto his shoulder.

"Thanks Scorp. You're the best friend a girl could ever ask for."

Friend. That word always stung when it came from her. This was getting ridiculous. He'd been in love with her for two years and she had shown no interest in him other then friendship. Over the years she had gone out with other guys, had a boyfriend even. Sure Nott had been a right git, but he had still been her boyfriend. Scorpius sighed, it was time for him to move on, and not with Violet Finnigan. He made the descision right then, he was going to stop pining after the girl who would never see him as more then just the best friend. Rose wanted friendship and he was going to give it to her, but he needed to put his other feelings for her aside and start over.

"Scorp? You alright?" She looked up at him with her big brown eyes. "You look kind of dazed."

"Uh, I'm fine Rosie, just you know thinking about stuff." He said.

"What kind of stuff?"

"You know just lessons and such." Rose didn't look convinced.

"Right, sure you were. Anyways lets go find Al and Charlotte and see if they're up for a game of exploding snap by the lake."

Rose hopped up and closed her locker and Scorpius followed her out of the locker room. He loved the way that her hair shone in the sunlight. She had turned into such a beautiful girl over the years. She was smart and funny and the most beautiful girl he had ever seen. Getting over her was going to be a lot easier said then done.