The Bet

Chp 3, Hospitality Hospital Style

Rose awoke in the infirmary, her head pounding in ways she only thought happened in books. An involuntary unfeminine groan escaped her chapped lips, a huge pout coming on. Rose was the queen of pouts, her puppy dog eyes and full lips perfect for creating an adorable yet equally annoying look. She didn't even bother opening her eyes before she switched to a defeatist mode.

"I feel like a bucket full of hippogriff crap." She whined aloud, speaking to herself. The room smelled of unpleasant potions, and all that could be heard was her own heart beat which was amplified by millions due to her head injury. She could hear every pump of blood circulating her body, steady and slow.

"You look it, too." a very familiar voice said from beside her, the smooth, melodic words sending jolts of energy through her body. She blamed it on her own dislike for boy. Her eyes shot open in a scowl, looking him up and down.

"What are you doing here, Malfoy?" she snapped, sitting up too quick and causing her vision to blur white, a dizzying nausea overtaking her. She restrained the urge to vomit. "And why do I feel so bloody terrible?" she whined again, throwing her hands up in the air. She was being quite flip-floppy, an emotional roller coaster. She was not very tolerant to pain.

"It's the syrup Ms. Pomfrey gave to you to prevent comatose." He explained evenly, his calm demeanor just making Rosie even more angry. "She said it'd have a couple side effects, but she didn't tell me it'd make you look so atrocious. Otherwise, I would have taken the risk of you being out forever. That'd be a great sob story, wouldn't it? 'My girlfriend has been a vegetable for a year now, and it's all my fault' would have gotten me a good amount of 'sympathy' from the girls around here…" he said, still as nonchalant as he had in the beginning of the conversation.

Rose gave him an appalled look. "You're so pig-headed! Honestly! Is the only thing you think about women? " she inquired, disgusted. It bugged her beyond belief how womanizing Scorpius was. His using of other people for his own snogging pleasures did not fly well with her. He was a prefect for Merlin's sake!

"Well, attractive ones. Not women- or should I say girls- like you. I'm being serious, Weasley, you look atrocious. I don't know if I'll be able to escort you out of here until you fix yourself up." He hypothesized in what seemed like all seriousness.

"Oh, come on. I can't possibly look that bad!" she cried, having had enough of his prodding at her looks. Everyone else seemed to think she was considerable pretty… unless they were lying to her. Which she supposed could be a possibility. Was she actually a hog like Scorpius said…? She had never had an ounce of insecurity before Malfoy came in and tainted her mind with his constant ragging. Scorpius provided her with a mirror.

In the reflection, she saw a sickly pale face, borderlining on gray-colored, rimmed with wild, unkept orange-red hair. Her eyes had deep-set, dark bags underneath them and her lips were cracked with dehydration. Okay, so maybe she did look that bad. "Whatever, Malfoy. You act as if the only thing that matters is appearance and I happen to know that's not the truth. Take you for example: your slimy personality makes you fugly in everyone's eyes."

"Are you admitting that you think I'm physically attractive, Rose dearie?" he cooed, picking up her hand. She tore her petite fingers from his long, slender ones as quickly as possible.

"I am not! You're not the least bit handsome." She said defensively, though she knew it was a lie. Scorpius was indeed very pleasing to the eyes. With his perfectly sculpted face, gleaming beautifully messy hair, Quidditch player's physique, and his smoldering thunder cloud eyes… Scorpius was just plain glorious. If he didn't have such a stank attitude, Rose would more than likely have pursued him instead of rivaled him.

"You know bloody well I'm extremely attractive. You've got yourself a catch of a boyfriend. You're one lucky girl. Do you know how many people would kill for this position?" he continued cockily.

"Excuse me while I open the window, I have the air some of this arrogance out." She said, actually taking the effort to wobbly stagger to the window and pry it open, her legs almost giving out a couple of times due to Ms. Pomfrey's "medicine".

"Oh, that's clever, Rose. I must applaud you on your wit." He said sarcastically, though there was some truth in his words. From across the room, she growled in frustration. She could never win with this kid. And we all know how important winning is to Rose.

"Why are you here?!" she cried again, not having received an answer the last time she asked. She threw her arms out to the side, becoming animated like she always did when she got heated. After doing so, she had to stable herself with the window seal because the threat of toppling over was getting pretty real.

"First I had to go to the infirmary as a patient because that you broke my nose after your little hissy fit at breakfast. I'll have you know that your cloak got my blood all over it in the process. Ms. Pomfrey is now washing it and spelling the stain away. " he explained, recalling that morning.

"Why did you stick around, though? Do you just enjoy tormenting me?"

"Well, yes. But the reason I stayed was because that's what a good boyfriend would do. It'd be awfully suspicious if I left my girlfriend alone in the infirmary after we got in a fight resulting in her getting knocked out. You were like a rock, let me tell you. You've been out a whole five hours."

Scorpius really did have a way of talking too much, Rose noted. It was as if he just enjoyed to hear his own electrifying voice. Rose couldn't find the right words to respond to that. She didn't even know how she felt about it. She was almost touched that he had stayed by his own free will, despite the fact that his reasoning was so robotic. Luckily, Rose didn't have to say anything, because at that time, Ms. Pomfrey flitted into the room. Upon arrival, she gasped.

"Weasley, what are you doing out of bed? " she scolded, shooing her back to her frumpy white mattress. "And you, Malfoy, should be ashamed of yourself. What sort of prefect allows his girlfriend to jeopardize her health?" She was like a mother hen, tutting at her children chicks. There were a couple mumbles of apology from the both of them and she just gave them a suspicious look for a couple seconds before filling a spoon with some kind of rancid remedy . She popped it straight into Rose's mouth with no warning, leaving the red head gagging on both the terrible tasting medicine and her own surprise.

"You'll have to stay here for another hour or two to make sure you don't fall over in the hallways and injure yourself again. After that, you're free to go." She said, handing Rose her wizard's cloak, freshly washed. Ms. Pomfrey then exited the room once more, leaving the two alone again.

There was a quietness for a long time, both just thinking. That was one of the few things in common between the two: they could enjoy a good think. Rose's mind raced as she thought of anything, everything, and nothing all at the same time but she mostly thought of Scorpius. There had to be something underneath his cold exterior. There was no way someone could truly be so mean inside and out.

"Hey, Scorpius." She said staring at the ceiling from her place in bed.

"Hm?" he asked, eyes closed as he sat in the uncomfortable chair.

"Thanks for sticking around." She said genuinely.

"Mm." was his response, though if you looked hard enough you could see a slight grin tugging at the ends of his lips.

"Hey, Scorpius?" she said again after a pause.

"Yes?" he purred.

"Do you really think I'm ugly?" she asked, hoping for a moment of honesty.

"Of course, Weasley." He replied, a full on smirk on his face. He flicked his slitted eyes to look at her reaction. She looked positively devastated. She turned over in the bed to face him instead of the ceiling, a pleading, panicked expression plastered on her face. He chuckled at how sincerely young she looked, like a frightened four year old.

When she realized that he was messing with her, she glowered and threw her pillow at his face. "You bloody jerk!" she growled, to which his chuckles only grew. His laughter rung throughout her office until Rose, too, began to laugh. Neither quite knew what was so funny, yet they laughed and laughed and laughed, glee bubbling in the air between them.

"No, but really… you should probably comb your hair or something." Said Scorpius as he was wiping a tear from his eye. Rose instantly sobered up, eyeing him moodily.

"You're impossible to please, Malfoy."

"You're impossible in general, Weasley."

"I still hate you. Don't think that because we shared a couple chuckles I all of a sudden like you." She said flatly, being as frank as Frank himself.

"I hate you too, my wonderfully chipper girlfriend. You're still my biggest rival and number one on my list of prats."

"Why are you calling me your girlfriend when there's no one around? We don't have to pretend here, Scorpius." She inquired, raising her fine eyebrows in curiosity.

"It has a certain ring to it, I think. And we have to start the habits now, or else when we're in public we might accidentally say 'I love you, swine.' Instead of a term of endearment. I've got this all mapped out in my head, Rose. Don't worry." He answered sarcastically, his signature grin gracing his face.

"You're a daft, sketchy, and all-in-all revolting boy, Malfoy." she informed him, her tone flat and casual, as if they were talking about the weather.

"And you love me all the same." He cooed, patting her hand. Rose ran a hand through her hair and hopped out of her seat, an irritated sigh rumbling from her throat. She grabbed her things and walked back to her dorm, uttering a short, half-hearted farewell to Scorpius. She needed to think, and she definitely could not concentrate anymore with her butt-headed companion.

She passed by all the people in the common room without saying so much as a "hello" and ignoring everybody who tried to interrogate her. It had been a long, long day. Rose desired nothing more than to curl up in her sea of blankets and think about how much she disliked Scorpius. So that was exactly what she did.

"There's not too much of a difference between loathing and loving, Weasley." could not be shaken off of her mind, as she fluttered to sleep.

A Word from the Author:

This chapter was a pain to write. It was just kinda dull and... blah. Review please!