'She's saying nothing.' - Arctic Monkeys, Secret Door

It barely takes a day for me to settle back in to the familiar routine of Hogwarts for the shortest term of the year, and unfortunately it only takes until the weekend for James to take the stress of his upcoming NEWTs out on the Quidditch team.

"I SAID RUN, YOU LAZY FUCKERS."

We sprint across the Quidditch pitch, touch the white line marking the outer boundary, and sprint back. And again. And again.

"James, chill. This is ridiculous." Lily gasps, coming to a stop and panting in the middle of the pitch, gazing desperately at James, who is watching us with his hands on his hips and an unimpressed look on his face.

"DON'T GIVE ME THAT BULLSHIT, POTTER. THE RAVENCLAW MATCH IS IN TWO WEEKS, AND YOU LOT NEED TO MOVE YOUR SORRY ARSES AND TRAIN HARDER IF WE WANT TO HAVE ANY HOPE OF BEATING THE EAGLES!"

"Jay, even if Quentin manages to catch the Snitch before Al, which is bloody unlikely, they're still not going to win unless they have a 200 point goal difference on us, and you know it." Ria yells at him as she jogs past Lily.

"DID I ASK FOR YOUR OPINION, YOU MUTINOUS WENCH?! NO, I DID NOT, SO - "

"JAY! JAMES! JAMIE! J-BEAR! IT'S A FUCKING MIRACLE !" comes a shout from beyond the stands.

"Fred?" James stops in his tirade.

Like a tall, brown-haired saviour in slacks and an untied Gryffindor tie, Fred comes sprinting in to the pitch, waving a sheet of parchment in the air.

"THEY'VE BEEN CANCELLED! OH, JJ, PRAISE MERLIN, WE'VE BEEN SAVED!" He screams, as my brother grabs his arms.

"Fred, what the hell is going on?" James, still in Captain mode, starts to get annoyed as we all stop running to stare at Fred.

"NEWTS HAVE BEEN CANCELLED!" Fred screeches in his face.

James, eyes wide, grabs the parchment out of his cousin's hands and reads it quickly. He looks up, beaming. "I COULD KISS THOSE RAVENCLAWS!" He yells, as he lifts Fred up and kisses him sloppily on both cheeks, before they both sprint back out of the pitch, yelling "SEVENTH YEAR PARTY!"

There's a moment of shocked silence, before Lily walks over and picks up the abandoned parchment. She skims it, before grinning up at us. "Two of the seventh-year Ravenclaws stole the NEWT questions and answers from the Ministry, so the exams have been postponed until November." She gazes off to where Fred and James have disappeared. "I guess this means practice is over."

"Well, thank Godric for that." I sigh, pulling off my Quidditch jersey smoothly and dropping onto the ground in an exhausted heap as the others whoop and trail out of the pitch.

"Preach it, man." Scor's jersey is thrown on the floor as he collapses on top of me, bare sweat-slicked back sticking to my chest.

"Urgh." I shove him, but I'm too tired to put any force into it, as he throws his arms out on either side of me in a dead weight.

I growl as another sweaty jersey is flung on my face, and manage to shove it onto the grass in time to see Ria wink at me as she saunters towards the changing rooms in her bra and sweatpants.

Scor wolf-whistles.

"Mate, get the fuck off me." I struggle to get up, my mind on my girlfriend, but Scor refuses to move.

"Time for that later, man. Don't interrupt our male bonding experience."

"Oh, for Godric's sake." I flop back onto the grass.

Sensing that I'm not going anywhere, Scor rolls onto the grass beside me with a moan, and shifts so that his head is level with mine as he stares up at the clouds.

"Ria coming again tonight?"

"Mmm." I answer in the affirmative. She spends every night in my bed now, sprawled across me after we fornicate. I wake up to her, have breakfast with her (thanks for Josh's musical alarm clock), see her in most of my classes, have lunch and dinner with her, spend time with her in the common room, and then fall asleep with her.

It's kinda great, actually.

It's silent for a moment, but Scor's not the type of guy to go without talking for more than a few minutes, so I'm just readying myself for a sappy comment about Rose, but instead he comes out with:

"Al, I've gotta say that I really think my abs are better than yours."

I roll my eyes and whack him in the stomach.

"Keep dreaming, Malfoy."

"But just look at them." We both struggle up on our elbows and gaze at his toned stomach and then look at mine.

There's just no comparison. I roll my eyes again at his delusions and collapse back onto the ground, muttering. "I think I preferred it when you couldn't stop talking about Rose."

Right on cue, Scor sighs. "Doesn't that beautiful cloud look just like Rosie?"

I follow his finger to a fluffy white cloud that looks to me more like a snowball than my tall, skinny cousin.

I snort and Scor laughs, grinning at me. "Just kidding, man. Love doesn't mean you have to talk to or about that someone all the time, or see them 24/7."

I frown up at him as he slowly pulls himself to his feet and offers a hand to help me up. "Now hurry up, because I need to persuade my girlfriend to help me with that Transfiguration essay."

I grab his hand and am pulled to my feet in one fluid motion, grabbing the discarded Quidditch jerseys quickly before Scor throws his arm around my shoulders and walks me to the changing rooms, chattering in my ear about the hardships of conjuring birds non-verbally.

It is only when we reach the door of the stinking Gryffindor changing rooms that I shrug his arm off my shoulder. "Scor, it smells like Frank's taken a shit and forgotten to flush again. Let's just head back up to the castle and shower in the dorm."

Scor looks at me, horrified. "Head back up to the castle? In my Quidditch kit?" He looks down at his sweat-stained, wrinkled jogging bottoms, disgusted. "You must be joking."

He turns and ploughs into the reeking room with a second glance.

I shrug, chucking his and Ria's Quidditch jerseys at his back, before taking the long walk back up to the castle alone.

I wink at some guys who ogle my chest in the Entrance Hall, and catch a fourth year moonwalking back up a moving staircase to steal a second glance too, before her friend pulls her back down, audibly hissing. "Don't even think about it. Don't you know he's dating Ria Black? She'll kill you if you so much as look at Albus Potter."

I grin. Ria, the girl with a sky-high self-confidence and no concept of jealousy, would do no such thing, but while she may be pretty damn popular, it's clearly gotten around the school that it's a bad idea to get on the wrong side of her.

I strut into the Gryffindor common room, spot my best friends in the coveted seats by the fire, walk over to glare at the first year reading quietly in the armchair next to my girlfriend, then arrange myself appealingly in the newly-vacated seat.

IPad in her lap, and headphones on, Ria glances around distractedly, eyes sparkling when she catches my gaze. She snakes her hand into my lap and threads her fingers through mine, before going back to the screen balanced on her knees, leaving me to gaze around the common room.

First years braiding each other's hair, second years playing Gobstones, third years practising charms, fourth years playing Exploding Snap, fifth years poring feverishly over revision notes, sixth years goofing off, and … a conspicuous lack of seventh years.

"Where are all the seventh years?" I say out loud, to no one in particular, sure that either all-knowing Lysander or high-and-mighty Rose will answer.

"Apparently there's a party for seventh years going on in the Room of Requirement. I heard something about NEWTs being postponed." Emma says, looking up from where she is curled up on the floor in front of the fire. She smiles at me, before seeming to actually look me over, and consequently hits me with a gentle Cleansing Spell, before turning back to her parchment, satisfied.

I lounge back into the warm armchair, rolling my eyes when I hear Rose and Lysander arguing nearby.

"It's fully understandable to class it as an Unforgivable, because it's taking control of someone's mind, Rose."

"And you're saying that a Laceration Curse that cuts into your skin and can rob you of some of your limbs isn't just as bad, twunk, if not worse?"

"Yes, because a Laceration Curse doesn't rob you of your free will."

"Hey, thanks for the quill, Ria."

At the sound of the deep, very masculine voice, that is definitely not Lysander's or Rose's or Emma's, I sit up straight and glare over to where Levitt is grinning down at my girlfriend. I growl. Ria takes the quill offered to her and smiles back. "No problem, Aaron. Whenever you need a quill again, just ask me, yeah?"

He slaps her on the back and nods, before hulking back over to his group of Musclers. I open my mouth to say something about Levitt's repulsive bathroom habits, before catching sight of Lysander's raised eyebrow and slouching back into my seat, annoyed.

Fucking guys all over my girlfriend. If only she wasn't so . . . argh.

I take out my frustration on the multiple leather bracelets tied around the slim, tanned wrist in my lap, sorting through them and scowling at each one as if each was given to her by an ex-boyfriend.

I frown as my hands catch the delicate silver chain hidden amongst the leather: a thin bracelet with a tiny silver key dangling off it. It's a bracelet that I've seen many times before, as Ria never takes it off. It's around her wrist in class, when she sleeps, and even at parties when it doesn't match the gold jewellery she may be wearing (yes, I do know that she's not one for matching clothes or jewellery).

But I've never asked her about it, and I doubt Emma, Rose or Sander have either, just because it's so tiny that it seems rather insignificant.

"Babe?"

There's no answer.

"Ri?" I lean over and poke her, still with a finger in the silver bracelet.

"Hmm?" She pulls off her headphones and grins at me. I grin back, before remembering what I pulled her away from her music for.

"What's this?"

I hold up her wrist, with the leather bracelets pushed away to leave the silver one clear.

Ria's grin slips immediately but her eyes stay forcefully light-hearted as she shrugs. "Just a bracelet."

"I doubt that; you were wearing it when I met you, and I've never seen you take it off since."

"Cos it's a nice bracelet, don't you think?"

I roll my eyes. "What does the key open?"

Ria gently pulls her wrist away from me. "Nothing, Al; it's just a stupid charm on a charm bracelet. No deeper meaning."

I grit my teeth. "Why don't you t- "

I'm distracted from my questioning as Mr-I-Can't-Be-Seen-In-Sweatpants saunters into the common room, blond hair shining, and dressed neatly in cord slacks and a bright pink shirt. He looks over at Rose and Lysander, still arguing about whether the Imperius Curse should be an Unforgivable or not, and winces, seeming to give up his hope of getting Rose to help with the essay.

Instead, he breezes past me, still somehow smelling of coconut and cinnamon, as always, even after his dance with death in the reeking Gryffindor changing rooms, and squeezes himself gracefully into the armchair with Ria. She grins, relieved, and Enlarges her headphones, fitting one end over his head as they both turn to look at the iPad screen.

I roll my eyes (again) and head up to the dorm to take a sweet-smelling shower.