Chapter 4 - In which Scorpius is violated

In Herbology the next day, Professor Longbottom was attempting to teach the class how to distinguish such and such a plant from such and such another plant. "It's really quite important," he said, "Because one of them can be very poisonous and…"

Al went back to droning Longbottom out. This was their first Herbology class of the school year, and it was proving to be just as dull for him as usual. Next to him, Scorpius kept falling asleep on a poisonous plant.

"Now, you can get to work," Longbottom said, in his shy voice. "Oh! And I have an announcement!"

"He's really a house elf in disguise!" Scorpius whispered. "I knew it!"

"Well," Longbottom began, a slight blush on his fact, "Susan, er, I mean, Professor Bones and I are going to have a baby!"

Half of the girls (and a couple of the boys) squealed in delight. A group of girls nearest him began questioning him. How far along was she? Were they hoping for a boy or a girl? Had they started thinking of names yet? Professor Longbottom responded to their questions kindly, most of the time the answer being, "I'm not sure."

Scorpius sniffed. "I would've thought old Bonesy would be too old to have kids. Or at least, that no one would want to with her."

"They've been married for years, though," Al said. "I mean, if somebody would want to marry her, then I suppose somebody would want to…"

Scorpius turned slightly green. "Ugh! Can you just imagine that? Longbottom and Bonesy? Lying around and humping each other?"

Several heads turned when he said this. "Just because you can't get any doesn't mean that you should deny anyone else!" somebody shouted out.

"Besides," Al began, "Aren't you the one who's always making bone jokes about her?"

Scorpius shrugged this off. "Bones and Longbottom. Wow. You wonder why she never changed her name and then you hear what it almost became…" He shuddered. "Seriously, though, boner jokes are one thing, but actually picturing them making it is just… ugh! I'm going to be traumatized!" He crossed his eyes and reached his hands out in front of him. "Al, is that you? I think I'm blind!"

In the Gryffindor common room, James found Lily lying on one of the couches. "Hey, Lily," he said. "I was looking for you last night, but I guess you'd already gone to bed, and when I tried to go in there this alarm went off."

"Oh, hi, James," she said. "Yeah, it does that sometimes."

"Anyway, are you alright? You looked sick last night," James said.

"I'm okay. I was just talking with Al, and…"

"Did he say something to you?" James asked. "Want me to go beat him up?"

Lily smiled. "I don't think that'll be necessary."

"Really? Damn. I was really hoping to. I have a lot of new spells I'd like to try out."

"No, really, he didn't say anything to me," Lily said. "He just seemed really sick, is all, and I was worried that he might be ill."

"Oh, okay," James said. "I guess I'll let him live then."

Lily giggled and then they were silent for a moment.

"James…" Lily started, in barely more than a whisper. "Do you ever remember things that never really happened?"

"Well, if I remembered them, then how would I know that they never happened?" James asked.

"Well, if you remember a place you've never really been and people who you've never really met, I suppose," Lily said. "Do you ever do that? Keep dreaming about the same people and places, but people and places you never really knew?"

James thought for a moment. But, for whatever conclusion he came to in his mind, he nonetheless said, "Nope. Never."

"Okay" Lily said. "I was just wondering." She hopped up and walked to her dormitory. "Goodnight, James."

"Night, Lil," James replied.

It was several days before Scorpius got a chance to speak with Lily. She was just coming out of her Transfiguration class when he spotted her with a group of her friends.

"Hello, ladies!" Scorpius said, swooping in front of them. A couple of them shrieked and one hissed at him. "My, I see you're all coming along quite well. Why, Jenny, you must be a B cup already!"

The tiny Gryffindor squeaked and hid behind the hissing girl.

"What do you want, you asshole?" dear, sweet Lily Potter said.

"Actually, I wanted to speak with you," Scorpius said. "Alone, if you don't mind. How about we just slip into my bedroom and" -Lily raised her wand threateningly- "Alright, fine, we can talk out here."

Lily walked away from her friends and beckoned Scorpius toward her. Scorpius turned to the girls. "Well, sorry to leave you so soon, girls. Swing by my place tonight if you get a chance."

Scorpius trotted after Lily, leaving her scared and confused friends behind. "So," he said, "No kiss for Uncle Scorpius?"

"No, but I'll kick you in your balls, if you want," Lily said.

"Hmm. Well, to tell the truth, I'm not too fond of kicking," Scorpius said. "But I can think of a few other things you could do to them…"

"Aw, but kicking's so much fun," darling Lily said. "Anyway, what did you want to talk to me about?"

"Well, it's about your brother, actually," Scorpius said. "Let's see… How to put this… So, is he a fucking psychopath or what?"

"Better than being an uncontrollable sex fiend," Lily said.

"Well, after the other day, I'm not so sure that we can rule that out, either," Scorpius said.

Lily gave him a hard look. "Watch out, or I may have to chop off your dick."

"Just so you can keep it to yourself, I'm sure," Scorpius said. "Anyway, you haven't answered my question: Is he a fucking nutter?"

Lily looked down at the floor. "He's not crazy."

"Then what was with that freak out?" Scorpius said. "He seemed pretty crackers to me."

"He's not crazy," Lily repeated, her eyes still on the floor.

"This hasn't been the first time he's done something like this," Scorpius said.

"What do you mean?" Lily asked.

"Last year he tried to throw himself off the Astronomy Tower."

"He didn't!" Lily shrieked, sudden panic in her voice. "Why would he?"

"How the fuck should I know?" Scorpius asked. "I just woke up and he was walking around and muttering to himself. So, I followed him around the castle, trying to figure out where he was going. He kept going back at some points and retracing his steps, so I was sure that he would see me, but I guess he was sleep walking, because he never noticed me. Anyway, then he went up to the Astronomy Tower and he just stood at the doorway for a while before he walked to the edge. Then he just stood there, facing toward me like he was going to just let himself fall backwards. But when he started to let himself swing back, I grabbed onto him and pulled him forward. And when he woke up, instead of saying that he was sleep walking, he started yelling at me that I'd messed up his concentration or something."

Lily looked sick. "Do you think he would have really jumped?"

"Yeah!" Scorpius said. "He looked like he was going to, anyway. It scared the shit out of me. I seriously came this close to pissing myself!"

"Thank you for that bit of vital information, Scorpius," Lily said, dryly.

"So, is he cracked up or not?" Scorpius asked.

Lily sighed. "I don't know. Why don't you talk to him about it?"

"Okay, fine, I'll talk to him soon," Scorpius said. He looked down at his watch. "Say, we still have about twenty minutes before either of our classes start. What say we head up to the old Room of Requirement and…"

"Go fuck a dementor," Lily said before storming off in the other direction.

James, after a week of practice, had finally learned to conjure a (nearly) perfect patronus. Mickey joined him almost every day. She was a bit more awkward at making friends than her brother was, so the time she spent with James was almost all of the social contact she had. Alex, at least, could cover up his airiness if need be, and he was much less likely to say odd things.

And James, who had (almost) never said no to any friendship, felt that even spacey Mickey was fun to be around when she wasn't acting too strange.

"Alright, what spell should I work on next?" James asked, a snowy stag walking around him.

Mickey's tree frog met James' stag. "Hmm," she began, "It would be good to know a nice protection spell from Higmets. They're not hard to come across in cold weather."

"Or," began James, "I could work on some protection spells from, say, other spells."

Mickey shrugged. "Either way."

By the next day, the two of them had grown comfortable with dueling one another. James would shoot out a spell and Mickey would try to block it, and then the reverse would happen. Hogwarts didn't have a dueling club, but James was quickly coming to the conclusion that it should.

"I'm already Quiddich captain, so I couldn't be the one to set it up," James said. "But you could."

"No one would come," Mickey said. "People like you. You should do it."

Some bit of James' inner self wanted to bask in this, but he quickly shoved that arrogant part of himself down and said, "No, people like you, too. How about if you be the president or captain or whatever and I'll be the vice president or captain or whatever."

Mickey smiled. "Alright. If you'll think it will work."

"Great!" James said. "I'll ask McGonagall about it tomorrow."

Mickey smiled. James looked at her for a moment, trying to figure out what was different about her. Then he realized that he had never seen her smile with her teeth before. It really suited her.

When Scorpius walked into his dormitory, he found Al juggling three multi-colored balls. "I've never been able to do this before!" Al said excitedly.

Al was nearly always serious, and sometimes he even neared the point of scariness, but every now and then this playful side of him would emerge.

"Oh, I got some chocolate frogs in a package from my mum," Al said, never losing his concentration on the juggling balls. "They're on my bed if you want some later."

"Sure, thanks," Scorpius said. "Maybe later."

Al stopped juggling, catching all three balls and cradling them in one of his arms. "Ta da!" He took a bow.

"You're very strange sometimes," Scorpius said.

Al chucked the juggling balls onto his bed. Stepping toward Scorpius, he said, "That reminds me: there's something I wanted to check, and as long as I'm in a good mood I might as well do it now."

"Huh?" asked Scorpius.

The was a slight twinkle in Al's eyes. He walked up to Scorpius. Scorpius put his hand on his wand. "Oh, he's going to hex me, I just know it," Scorpius thought to himself.

And this was when Scorpius became absolutely convinced that Albus Potter had lost his marbles. Al leaned forward and -"Oh, no, what now?" Scorpius thought to himself- gave Scorpius a solid kiss on the mouth.

Scorpius let out a little shriek. He tried jumping away from Al, but at some point Al had apparently put his arms around Scorpius. The two of them toppled forward onto Scorpius' bed. "I'm trapped!" though Scorpius. "He's gone completely mental and here I am squished under him."

Right when Scorpius was thinking that perhaps Al had merely planted him with the kiss of death, Al grinned, his eyes ever twinkling. "Come on. Aren't you curious?"

"What? No!" shrieked Scorpius. He tried to wriggle out from under Al. "Are you crazy?"

"Probably," said Al, before planting another kiss onto Scorpius. This one was longer, and Scorpius knew that he must be as red as a tomato and, oh! What the fuck was going on?

Finally, Scorpius gave a mighty shove, pushing Al off of him and onto the floor. "You're crazy!" shouted Scorpius. "I knew it. You're a bloody nutter."

Al smiled, his eyes still glimmering. "Sorry. Had to be done. It was an experiment."

"What? You wanted to see if I was a better kisser than your sister?" Scorpius screeched.

Albus laughed. "Not quite."

Right then Philip Nott walked into the room. There was Scorpius, lying down on his bed and as red as a cooked lobster. And beside him was Albus, on the ground and howling with laughter.

Al looked up at Nott. "You just missed the funniest thing," he said, still laughing.

Scorpius stood up and pushed past the very confused looking Nott. No way was he sleeping in the same room as that psychopath that night.