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Challenges listed at the bottom.
Word Count: 633
Assignment 6: Healer Studies: Task #2: Dragon Pox: Write about someone who doesn't have many/has trouble making friends.
Warning: Suicide
Flying (Or Falling)
Scorpius Malfoy sat at the end of the Hufflepuff table, his head down, eyes on the page of the book he was pretending to read. This was the way he spent most of his meals, though usually he was at least able to concentrate enough to actually read.
Today he couldn't.
He could hear them muttering about him a little up the table, barely bothering to keep their voices down.
He should be used to it by now, he knew. The curse of his last name had followed him since he was born, but it still hurt.
If it had been anyone else to get the spell right the first time, they'd have been congratulated on the house points and the praise from the teacher. Because it was him, he was dark, he was to be watched and they were to be suspicious.
Scorpius really, really hated Hogwarts.
…
He'd had high hopes on the train. Growing up, he hadn't had many friends because his parents kept to themselves a lot, but he'd hoped that going to school would change that.
Until his name had been called out for the sorting.
The whole hall seemed like it was holding its breath, everyone watching and waiting to see if he'd end up in Slytherin. Scorpius had hoped he wouldn't. He wanted to be known for being Scorpius, not Malfoy, and he'd hoped he'd have a better chance elsewhere.
It was only when he spent his first night in Hufflepuff alone, while the other's all chattered and glared at him across the room, that he understood the saying be careful what you wish for.
…
He tried. He really did.
When it became clear that the Hufflepuffs in his year weren't going to accept him, he tried to make friends with people in the other houses. He focused on the Muggleborns, because they wouldn't know who his father was, or worse, his grandfather.
It didn't help.
Word travelled fast, it seemed, because nobody wanted to give him the time of day. Even the Slytherins, whom he'd thought he could fall back on, sneered at him and pushed past him, purposefully trying to knock him off his feet.
He just… wasn't going to have any friends.
It was fine. He was fine.
Honest.
…
The teachers checked in on him. They tried to partner him up with people, but that didn't help either. In the end, people wanted to be partnered with him because they knew he wouldn't argue when they left him to do the work on his own.
They figured it was an easy outstanding mark.
Scorpius gave up complaining and turned to books. But books didn't talk to him, or laugh with him, or hug him.
Books didn't tell him everything would be okay.
Books couldn't fill the hole inside him that just wanted someone, anyone, to like him for him.
…
Scorpius slammed the book shut and got up from the table, swiping his bag as he stood. He slung it on his back and left the hall, heading for the stairs. He couldn't take the whispers anymore.
It was windy and cold at the top of the Astronomy tower, but blissfully silent of whispers and sniggers.
Scorpius perched himself on the wall, swinging his legs over so that he was sitting in the open air, the wind making his hair fly around his head.
He was so tired of trying, so tired of pretending that everything was okay. He wanted everything to stop.
He'd never been good at flying—his broom hit him in the face in their first flying lesson—but this time, with the wind jostling him as he flew and flew and flew… he thought that maybe he was good at this.
Or maybe he was just good at falling.