The next few weeks passed far too slowly for Lily. They had to be careful where they saw each other in the castle so they wouldn't get caught out. They had been careless in Hogsmeade and although they managed to get away with it, they didn't want to push their relationship being exposed when they didn't want it to be. Lily had had boyfriends in past but nothing as serious as Scorpius and this was all still new to her. She knew she loved him but the complexity of other people getting involved was something she just wasn't ready for. The other thing she didn't want to face this early was her family. Her boyfriend was her brother's best friend and her whole family have had their view on Malfoys since the second wizarding war. Her friends in her dorm knew but that was different – or at least that's what she keeps telling herself. Lyra had asked a bunch of questions after each date and Lily left no detail untold. She told Lyra when she would go on dates and what they did on each one; whether it was a quick night in the prefect dorms or a long walk into Hogsmeade or the grounds. This helped Lily to get anything off her chest that she was either excited or nervous about.
It was the last week of term which meant practice OWLs for Lily, she had been studying really hard and had spent many sessions studying with Scorpius in the prefect dorms so they could be alone. Today they were going over some potions work, this was Lily's worst subject and she was stuck on the components of one of the befuddling draught. She knew the ingredients, but it was the way it was brewed that she just couldn't get.
Scorpius could see the frustration on her face as she furrowed her auburn brows "C'mere, what are you confused on?"
"This!" Lily whined pointing to the section in her potions book. "The order of the ingredients makes no sense! How long to keep it on the burner and…"
"Lils, Lils, Lils, break it down into steps and write it in an order with numbers. Like step one preheat the cauldron for 5 minutes. Step 2 add the sneezewort and scurvy grass into the cauldron. Step 3 stir slowly for 2 minutes. If you write it out like that it'll make it much easier to comprehend." Scorpius could Lily's brow relax as the potion began to make more sense. This made his heart swell, Lily was a perfectionist with her work and was so scared that failing this OWL would crush her dream of being a healer, Scorpius just wanted to support her on this journey.
Lily felt calmer with Scorpius' simple solution that made the potion make much more sense. She wrote the spell out on some parchment in her folder of her potions revision. Lily had a folder for everything. It helped her to keep everything organised and made her feel in control of her studying. Her potions folder was black with Potions written on it in white ink. The folder was slowly becoming thicker as she revised more, at the moment it was about half an inch thick of Lily's revision. "Got it!" She smiled "okay so this potions got 6 steps, I've broken it down so its all there but much easier than Professor Thomas explained it."
"Anything you find hard like this just break it down. Then you'll boss this OWL on Thursday." He smiled a goofy smile, Lily had only ever seen it directed at her. To the outside world Scorpius was a serious straight-faced man with sharp wit and sarcasm, but to Lily he was smiley and goofy.
Lily beamed, Scorpius had a way of making things make sense for her and making her feel calm. She needed this a lot now. She was so desperate to do well on her exams; they were only practice exams but if she did well now then she knows she can do it in the summer. Lily was broken out of her happy daze by the 6pm bell notifying all students that it was dinner time. "All students must have reported to the Great Hall for dinner by 6:30 sharp"
"Sustenance fuels a studying mind" Scorpius held his hand out towards Lily as he stood from the bench they had been revising on.
Lily rolled her eyes. "Fine, let me just finish this page"
"Okay, I'll just organise my stuff." Scorpius began to pick up all the sections of parchment and put them into the folder Lily insisted he needed. She said that it would help him become more organised and help him retain more of his notes so he can revise better and more thoroughly. For Ancient Runes, she had gifted him a navy-blue file that he can bunch all his notes into. Not quite as neat as Lily's folders but much better than stuffed in his satchel bag.
Looking over at Lily's concentration on her last page made Scorpius smile, the way her long auburn hair drooped over to the left side as she wrote with her right hand and the little piece of her tongue that Lily had stuck out between her lips to 'help improve her concentration' she had told him. He didn't quite believe this but if it worked for her then he wasn't going to change it. God, he had his own weird way of revising, he had to have everything in bullet points written with the deep green quill he'd had since first year. It really needed sharpening as it was getting very blunt in his last piece of revision and was becoming barely legible. Scorpius made a mental note for himself to do that when he got back to his dorm tonight.
"Finished!" Lily exclaimed, bringing Scorpius out of his daydream. Lily began putting her notes into her folder. She was slow and purposeful with her parchment, she wanted it all in the right order ready for her further revision later on tonight. Scorpius half sighed, half chuckled to himself at this. She was such a perfectionist. "Ready?" she questioned pulling her satchel over her right shoulder.
"Sure, I'm starving! I really hope the house-elves have done a good feast for tonight, I could eat a whole Christmas feast right now." He expressed waving his hands as he spoke.
"I highly doubt you'd eat it all" Lily rolled her eyes at him.
Scorpius simply stuck his tongue out at her making Lily laugh. She tried to cover her mouth with her hand to cover the sound but it didn't reduce it much; gaining them a "sshh" from the librarian. "Come on you, before she tells us off properly" Scorpius chuckled as he put his hands on Lily's shoulders, careful to not catch her hair in his hands, and turned her towards the door. He could feel her roll her eyes as she skulked out of the library.
Once out of the door, they carelessly joined hands to walk to the Great Hall. Lily's heart began to pound as she realised they were in busy public, holding hands. Scorpius looked at ease, with his tall, correct posture and his head held high. She figured he had been taught to stand this way since he was young, but how he wasn't phased right now made Lily feel shocked and endeared all at once. She felt like he was proud to be with her and not hiding her. Not exactly how she planned to go public but 'fuck it' came to her mind. They continued to walk hand in hand down the corridor as soon as they entered the main corridor leading from the library towards the Great Hall Lily could feel the eyes of the on lookers. Some people began to whisper, a Malfoy and a Potter was kind of a big deal. Their families had had a running disagreement since before the great war. Lily was suddenly broken from her thoughts.
"Scorp! We eating or what? I'm starving, thought we were meeting in the common room at 6?"
Lily's eyes went wide with worry, the voice was unrecognisable. She tried to pull her hand out of Scorpius' and make it seem like it was a coincidence that they were stood together. There were many people in the corridor that would make that story plausible. It was filled with many students, from all the houses, heading towards the Great Hall for dinner. But Scorpius held tight.
"Scorpius, please can we not do this now?" Lily whispered anxiously; she wasn't too bothered when they were out in public when they could blend in, but this is in front of her brother. Face to face.
"Why not now, Lils?" He hissed back sharper than he intended. "He may as well know; he's my best friend and I really don't want to tip toe around him"
Lily was hurt by his tone but couldn't think of a response to that. She didn't realise how hard this time together had been on him keeping secrets. She'd been able to tell her friends; she talked about Scorpius and things between them with her friends, but he was having to keep this all to himself, unable to tell anyone the good and the bad. Plus, probably lying in the process who he was seeing when he snuck out. She realised it wasn't entirely fair to make him keep it a secret. However, this is not exactly how she imagined this meeting going.
"Scor! Where you been? I thought you'd be…" Albus trailed off. He looked at his best friend; his sister; and their hands in each other's. "What the fuck is this?"
"Albus, so I wanted tell you sooner but…" Scorpius began.
"Well you better fucking tell me now!"
Lily could hear the anger rising in Albus' voice. She internally cringed, she knew he would react this way. Her brothers taught her to hold her own at home but out of home they protected her. A lot. "Albus, we've tried to keep it low key but we've been dating for a month" It was straight to the point and laid most of their cards on the table.
Almost as soon as Lily said 'dating', she heard the thump of Albus' fist collide with Scorpius' jaw and immediately tears filled her eyes. At this a crowd began to gather, a Potter/Malfoy relationship was some serious gossip in itself but then a Potter/Malfoy fight was also some gossip. The combination meant anyone in earshot wanted to see what was going on. Unfortunately for Lily this meant most of the school. They were near the Great Hall where everyone was sat eating, including professors, and Albus's voice was carrying well. She knew if he got angrier it would only get louder too. She remembered the arguments in their house when they were little and Lily stole his training broom when he was 9. Their mum had double checked the silencing charm on their house due to the volume Albus produced.
"That's my sister! My fucking sister! She's not one of your trashy hook ups" Albus shouted with venom filling his words. His face had turned red to match the anger coming through in his words.
Lily stepped towards Scorpius to make sure he was okay, only to find him holding her at a distance from his body, not letting her get close to him.
"Do you think I don't fucking know that Al?" Scorpius spat rising to Albus' anger face going red. "I've not once treated her like a hook up!"
"I don't fucking care!" Albus shouted back "I'm her older brother and it's my job to protect her from fuckboys like you!" His knuckles turning white as he clenched his fists.
"She's a grown woman, dickhead! She can look after herself!" Scorpius defended. This only lead to another punch from Albus, at the mere insinuation that they may have slept together.
"Both of you please stop!" Lily screamed, but her words fell on deaf ears. Both men had both seen red and it wasn't going to be simple to pull the red rag from either of their eyes.
"Have you slept with her?" Albus spat over the folded Scorpius, tension filled the area. Lily froze not knowing where to go or how to protect both parties from getting hurt. They were both very strong men with a substantial punch power.
"Maybe, but is your sisters sex life your business?" Scorpius shouted beginning to stand up, only to receive another punch to push him further to the floor. He was doing all he could to control himself and not throw a punch back but this was proving difficult.
"It is if its with you! Your track record is fuck and leave" Albus shouted. "I'm not having that for Lily. She deserves better than you!"
Scorpius couldn't contain his anger anymore. "Lily is different, fuckwit." Throwing one punch to Albus' jaw that pushed him to the floor.
Before he could throw another punch or say another word he felt his body freeze.
"Petrificus Totalus!" Shouted professor Longbottom freezing both men in one swift motion from across the corridor. Scorpius and Albus both fell to the floor, held in one place unable to throw another punch or shout another venomous phrase at the other. Lily didn't need freezing but she did crumble into tears. She was so scared that this would happen between the two men. Her boyfriend and her brother were both important to her and to lose either of them – Lily didn't want to think about it. Plus, their friendship would need some serious work now. They'd had disagreements in the past but nothing like this. "Right, this is enough fighting for one day between you two! I expected better from you both!" Professor Longbottom shouted. "Professor Thomas please take these two idiots to the hospital wing"
"Of course, professor." Professor Thomas responded calmly. "Everyone else needs to leave the area. You have no further business gawking over these three and they deserve privacy."
"Miss Potter, are you okay?" Professor Longbottom continued.
Lily looked up, tears stinging in her eyes. "Not really Uncle Neville" She sniffled quietly.
"Right, while these two wait for that spell to wear off. We can go to my office and make sense of this mess" Professor Longbottom said softly holding out his hand.
Lily grabbed it and let him help her to her feet. Her eyes were bright red from all the tears and she could feel everyone's eyes on her watching her every move. No doubt some of this would quickly find it's way to her parents and she would have to try and explain herself.
